Bulwark Takes - The Melania Movie Is a $75 Million Bribe

Episode Date: January 31, 2026

Sonny Bunch saw "Melania" so you don’t have to and it’s no surprise that it’s not good. Sonny is joined by JVL to give their takes on why the movie makes no sense as a business proposition, Donald Trump’s central role in shaping its purpose, and the decision to put the project in the hands of Brett Ratner, a director exiled from Hollywood after multiple sexual misconduct allegations, as part of his attempted comeback.

Hello, everyone. This is JVL here with my bulwark colleague, Sunny Bunch, who has just seen the Melania movie. Melania. Here we go again. Fascinating, riveting documentary about a simple girl from Zalavakia who came to America, married a man who became president, and fell in love, lived happily ever after. Guys, this is a wild ride And Sonny's can actually tell you about the movie itself, which is going to be amazing. I can't wait. I'll be hearing those thoughts for the first time as well.

But first we have to talk about Sunny, the business of this movie because my sense is this isn't a movie. It's an open-air bribe. Is that unfair? No, no, look, my whole thing is you can't understand. You can't understand.

what is being made in Hollywood and what is being consumed in Hollywood. If you don't understand why it's being made, this is always, this is my big theory of writing about film. Like, you have to understand a little bit of the business side of things. And there is a business, there's a business case to be made for the Melania documentary. Conservatives, conservatives go to documentaries, the Dinesh DeSuzza documentaries, for instance, often make five to $15 million at the box office, right? The Daily Wire documentaries, the Daily Wire documentaries,

often make in the 15 million. And those are, those are big numbers for documentaries. You know, those are numbers that you don't see a lot of in the real world for just general documentaries. Now, those are all very cheap. Those are all very cheap movies. They're made for very little money. They don't cost very much. The thing about Melania is that it is a very expensive movie. Even it just by the standards of mid-budget filmmaking, it's a fairly pricey endeavor. We're talking about a $40 million. purchase price by Amazon MGM studios. Just for the rights. Just for, well, 40% to make it.

So 70% of that goes to Melania, goes directly to Melania Trump. Right. Her production company, Muse, I believe, is the same. Oh, she has a production company. She's a movie producer. Of course.

She's got a whole label in this thing. The, so 70% of it goes there. The rest, as far as I can tell, was spent on music rights. Let me tell you, this movie has, Gibby Shelter, this movie has Billy Jean. This movie has, This movie has a lot of things that have been percolating around in director Brett Ratner's brain, which brings me to the next part of why this movie exists.

This movie exists at least in part because Brett Ratner would really like to be making movies again. He got me too pretty hard. You know why? Because he got accused of some pretty bad things. Got accused of, he got accused of forcing Natasha Hensridge to perform oral sex on him. That's not, it's not good. You don't want to be accused of that. But he's a Trump guy.

I'll tell you what watching this movie the level of sycophancy that was coming out of Brett Ratner from kind of behind the camera like oh Mr. Trump you look so good it would really it really makes sense how he made it in Hollywood I would be like

I was like oh no I get it I get it now I get why Brett Ratner made it and Woody Allen has become a quasi Trump guy right like doing stuff with the free press and what I it's just interesting to me that the movie directors who seem to be most

open to Trump are guys credibly accused of shenanigans? Shenanigans. I don't know about the Woody Allen part of it. It's probably coincidence. No, I mean, that's different. I don't want to get into the Woody Allen. We don't have to get into it. I'm just saying.

Brett Ratner, but Brett Ratner, the other, like, Olivia Munn said that he masturbated in front of her without her permission. Like, there's all, there's all sorts of stuff there. He got, he got me too very hard. He got exiled from the polite community of Hollywood, which, as you know, it's not easy to get exiled properly from Hollywood, but he managed it. But he wants back in. He wants back in. One of the ways he has seen to get back in is to buddy up with the Trump administration through his business partner and friend Steve Mnuchin.

I believe he made the introduction to former Treasury Secretary to Stephen Mnuchin. and also, I believe, maybe not still, but at the time, one of the principles in the Rat Pack production company that Brett Ratner was part of. And because Paramount, we're now going to get into the paramount of it all, Paramount really wants to purchase Warner Brothers Discovery, wants to do all sorts of things. And as one, just as it, just after hearing that Donald Trump might be interested in such a thing, said, well, you know what, rush hour four is on the table now. We got, we're going to make another rush hour movie because they're so successful.

We got to get Brett Ratner back in involved with this thing. Brett Ratner is going to make a rush. So anyway, you cannot understand why this movie is getting made. You cannot understand why Amazon MGM Studios paid $75 million dollars between the rights, the production, and the marketing of this thing. A $35 million marketing budget, do a lot of documentaries get 35 mil behind them in prints and advertising? I'm glad you asked that, Jonathan,

because the answer is no. The answer, that's very unusual. The only reason you would do something like that is if you really wanted to demonstrate to somebody that you were putting a lot of money behind this thing. Well, I mean, there's another reason, though, isn't there? That you, if you want to reach an audience who is friendly to Trump for your movie,

you could spend that money advertising with friends of Trump, right? I mean, that's certainly, you're getting into conspiracy theories here. It just seems to me like they can spread it around amongst his friends. I can't even, I can't even dignify. No, it's insane. The amount of money being sent on this thing is insane, just all the way around. Because, again, there is a market for conservative documentaries if you make them for

about $2 million, not $75. For this movie to break. But that wouldn't be a very classy documentary, would it, Sonny? For $2 million, how classy could it be? You can't film on gold-plated prints if you do a $2 million. No, for this movie to make money, it's going to have to gross about $150 million. You know how many documentaries have grossed $150 million worldwide? Three in history.

It's not, it's not. It's not. It's a Fahrenheit for 9-11, bowling for Columbine, and Inconvenient Truth. No, no, no, no. It's Fahrenheit 9-11 is the biggest of all time. $220 million. The other two are just IMAX movies that played in in museums for years, you know? Like, it's not a...

Grand Canyon. Right. Yeah, that's one of them. That's one of them. But anyway, so this movie doesn't make any sense as a business proposition. So my understanding is that there was an auction for the rights to do this and that Disney was one of the bidders. and that Disney's bid was $14 million? Yes.

And that Amazon came over the top with $40 million. Now, I'm just a simple, a simple New York City journalist. Is that how you do like business when somebody's in auction and they say, well, you know, well, I bid $14 million. Well, I bid $40 million. is that smart business? I mean, Jeff Bezos is very rich. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a businessman, Jonathan. I am a simple, humble film critic who lives in Dallas, Texas.

And Jeff Bezos, as you said, has made a lot of money. So much money. So I couldn't say for sure. No, there were other bidders. There were other. Paramount bid $4 million. Paramount was like, this is a $4 million movie. And you know what?

Paramount's, that's about right. That's about the number. that this movie should have been bid at. Apple and Netflix, I think, stayed out of it entirely. No, but Amazon comes in over the top for $40 million. $14 million would have been a stretch for Disney, but I could see it as the sort of...

To make up for the Jimmy Kimmel thing. You got to make up for the Jimmy Kimmel thing. You got real problems with Jimmy Kimmel. I could kind of at least, I could make a plausible case for that. $40 million is too much money, plus another $35 million. In advertising, if these numbers are accurate,

it, which I have not been given good reason to think they're not. I've seen more ads for this Melania movie than I have for any other film that's the Hail Mary. It's like a $200 million sci-fi epic. I haven't seen any ads for that. Brian Gosling, yeah. I've seen a thousand ads for Melania. All right.

Final question. So you said that it's break-even number was going to have to be, what did you say? 150, let's say. 150 million. Okay. So that's what Amazon would need in order to break even. What does that translate to for opening weekend? So the multiplier typically, right, is like 2.9, right?

It's just the shorthand we use when we're making estimates that you, a movie opens to X dollars. And if you want to guess how much it will make lifetime, then, you just multiply that by 2.9 or so, right? 3.1, give or take. So Melania would have to open. Right. Would have to open to what? Well, JBL, you're, you're, well, it depends on if we're talking globally or domestically, right? Because you have to remember, this movie is opening in 27 nations.

This is opening in 27 territories. Amazon's really rolling it out there because the world is clamoring for Melania to hear her. To hear her. Yeah. So, yeah. Makes sense. But humor me. That would suggest the need for a $50 million opening, give or take, right?

Yeah, roughly. Yes. What is the... Worldwide, yes. What is the tracking on this? Can you explain to people what tracking is? You and I know what tracking. Explain to the people.

Tracking is the measure of how a film is doing with audiences. And there are different measures of tracking. There is awareness, which just means like, I am aware of this thing. I'm aware of this thing. And then there are the people who are actually interested in going to it, which is a different number. My understanding is that the tracking is. is around $5 million. I would guess between $5 and $10 million.

Okay. Is that less than $50? This is not going to open to $50 million. I don't think. I could be wrong. I don't know, JBL. Let me tell you. Make news media.

My 1245 Friday afternoon screening of Melania at the AMC North Park in Dallas, Texas, 80% full. People were excited for Melania. They got busted and they're there. So again, we're going to get to. the review part in a moment. But it does seem to me that if you were in a theater that was 80% full and then the movie only opens to $9 million, that means that the deep state is munking with the box office returns and will need investigations? I think we could very plausibly see some investigations into this, into the shenanigans that are going to be reported. No, I would say,

Look, this is a movie that Matt Bellany, who gets name checked in the movie, by the way, very funny. Matthew Bellany of Buck News. He reported that I believe the red state audience for this was 54% when the typical red state audience share is, I think, 36%. Something like that. Those are rough numbers. I don't have them right in front of me. Which suggests this is over-indexing in places like Dallas. I have no doubt that's true. I have no doubt that that is true. It is absolutely going to over-index. in places like Dallas. But again, even if it over-indexes here and it under-indexes on the coasts, if it does $10 million, that's a huge... In a normal world, a $10 million opening for a documentary is an enormous amount of money.

That's actually like a really... It's a really good opening if you haven't spent $75 million on it. It just doesn't make any sense. Okay. And Sonny, could you give us a big boy review of Melania, the document? Documentary?

Melania, the documentary directed by Brett Ratner. So it's interesting, describing this as a documentary as an absolute category error. And I realize that about three minutes into the movie, maybe even less, maybe 30 seconds into the movie, because this is not a documentary. It's a reality TV show. This is not a documentary where you have somebody kind of like capturing footage. And there's always questions as to how real documentary footage is. and, you know, what stage and what is. But this is a movie where Melania, Trump, is coming down steps,

and she is hitting marks, and she is going into seats, and the camera cranes up and goes over. And we're seeing the trail of SUVs, and they get to the private jet, and then we see the whole private jet. It's a reality TV show crossed with entourage, crossed with HBO's show entourage. That's what this is. It's this weird combination of lifestyle porn,

with hagiography and really good camera work. There are three professionally renowned cameramen working on this movie for Brett Ratner. Again, they did spend money on it. It's not cheap looking. I will give them that. It's not cheap sounding. They've got a good score with it. People were tapping their toes in the aisles.

It was a real thing. But it's not a documentary. This is not a documentary. It is a reality TV show. is keeping up with the Kardashians for Melania Trump. I mean, that is what this movie is. Ah, it was, look, I am not the target audience for this. And I will say that the, the audience of older Dallasites that I saw it with, clapping at the end of it. They were, they were, they were very into Melania. Sticking into the Lib Tards. They were sticking it to the libs,

man. I did not, I did not care for it. It was, it was pretty boring. Again, it's this, it has this fixation on the trappings of First Ladydom. It's all about the decorating and the rejiggering of things and it has these little kind of ideas of policy around the edges. There is

a touching scene with an October 7th kidnapping victim, you know, and like that. Again, it's serious stuff. I don't want to downplay it, but for the most part, this is not a serious thing. This is not a serious movie. Any January 6th stuff in it? Or no?

Yeah, no, no January 6th. I don't often get mad about these things because we live in the world we live in and getting mad about it. I leave that up to you, JVL. You're eating the sins of the world for all of us. I'm always mad. I appreciate it. But I did get mad a couple times watching this because there are several sequences where

she is talking about immigration. She has this very nice moment with a Laotian interior designer who talks about how she came here at the age of two. And she is living the American dream with this. other immigrants. It's immigrants helping immigrants, you know? I, my, my face was like, ready to explode. I was just like, I was, I was just like this is on top of, in the midst of everything that is happening in the way, in the midst of all the ice raids and kids getting hauled out of schools and, you know, like, real feel good immigrant

story here. Well, they just came here the right way, Sonny. They came here the right way with the genius visa. They came here. We did. We did. Shockingly, Brett Ratner did not go into Melania's Einstein visa for that she received to come here, which, you know, being hotness, look, I'm not going to downplay hotness. That's an important factor. Much hotter than Einstein, frankly. They should rename it the Melania visa. But that was very, that was very frustrating to me. That was very frustrating.

And the other thing, this wasn't even frustrating, but it was a real insight into what this, this reality. show is trying to do. So if you remember Jimmy Carter died just before the inauguration, and there's, and this movie, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, is set in the days leading up to the inauguration, the inauguration itself, but so Jimmy Carter dies. And she and, and Donald Trump go to the funeral. And the entire time that she is going to this funeral, she is talking about how her mother had died a year ago. not like not like offhandedly mentions or not even kind of like focuses on but like we're here to talk about we're here to celebrate the life of jimmy carter she never once mentions jimmy carter or anything he has done or anything he did i like you don't have to be an enormous fan of jimmy carter i'm not an enormous fan of jimmy carter but the the complete in total focus on her life for something that

happened again a year ago not it's not like her mother had died the day before and she had to go to this instead of going to her mother's funeral it was it was mind-boggling it was so it was so mind-boggling least solipsistic and and so but it was so perfect too because it is this is you know you can't say nice things about jimmy carter jimmy carter said bad things about donald trump you couldn't possibly say anything nice about habitat for humanity you can't even you couldn't even mention habitat for humanity in this movie. Again, like, you don't want to talk about Iran and you don't want to talk about the Middle East and all that stuff. That's fine. I understand that. But you could at least be like, and he built a lot of houses for poor people. And that was nice. And like, no, none of that.

It was just like all about her and her mom. And I was, I was watching that, I was just watching it, like, I almost feel like Brett Ratner is fucking with them. I like, I almost, like, this is, if I was a filmmaker and I wanted to make somebody look like a, insane narcissist. This is precisely what I would do. Now, I don't think he is. I don't think he, I don't think he has that, uh, that in him. But it's, uh, it was something else. It was something I was watching. I mean, the audience for that film would not have liked her saying a single nice word about Jim. Audience of one. We talk about, we talk about things having an audience of one. And this is a $75 million production with Prince and advertising, uh, that has an audience of one.

And I'm sure he'll be very happy with it. You know, he gets in some one. He gets in some one. He gets in some quips. The audience was laughing. People love Donald Trump. He's so funny. What do you think the odds are that he actually watches the whole thing all the way through? Because I'm sorry, it's not about him. And so I could see him dipping it out and then reading the clippings

about it. So Natalie Harp will print out a bunch of the best things being said about it, especially things which say how great he is in the movie. And I could see him spending a lot of time going through those things. But actually watching?

How long is this? 90 minutes? No, it's a little longer than that. It's about, I want to say, 105, something like that. Under five-minute movie about somebody else? Not sound like something Donald Trump would do. No, I can't imagine he watches the whole thing, because he's so busy working for us, the people.

He's got a lot of tweets to send out. He's got a lot of tweets to send out. No, what he's going to do is he'll get a review of this from Breitbart or somewhere, and he'll sign it and he'll fax it back to whoever wrote it. saying thank you for the nice words that you said about me and also you know my great my great wife milania but boy it's uh it's something else man it's uh it's a it's a it's a ridiculous thing who comes off worst who comes off worst of all the characters are in there is there any like steve did does he do stephen mill or dirty no no i like it there there isn't much focus on

anybody else really i would say the person who comes across worse honestly is brett ratner because again, you hear him in the background, being like, being like, oh, isn't this so great? Isn't this so, I can't believe I'm here in the White House and it's so great. Wow. It's so toad-like that it's just, it's, again, I, like, I could see why he has been, or why he was at least a big success in Hollywood. He knows where his bread is buttered. And right now it's buttered by, by Donald Trump and the. Are any of the Trump children in this film? this is so this is the one thing i will say the one moment the moments where she really sparks to life is when she's talking about baron and it's very human jbill it's very human

loves her kid she's very tall he's very tall he's like six nine he's enormous um that that baron trump uh none of the other children get much we see them kind of in the background occasionally you know moving around but jd vance does not get uh much play he does he does again he gets framed there's one shot where he's kind of in the background and he's backlit and you just you see like the shape of his head through the light. And it was like, I was like, oh, man, if I was, if I was J.D. Vance, I would not be happy. I know because I know how my head looks backlit like that. I'm like, oh, pumpkin head. That's not, that's not good. You're not going to like that. Are you prepared for the world we're going to live in 15 years from now when Baron Trump is an important public figure in America? Because that's coming. Lord Baron Trump. Baron Trump, who will be worth, I don't know, $10 billion, seen as his father's heir. It's going to be great. It's coming.

I'm excited for it. It's coming. I'm excited for the Baron Trump sequel. Brett Ratner can do Melania too. Baron. Wow. So that's the thing that happens. We have opening of bribery markets and hagiography and, I don't know,

what would the Lenny Reef install version of this documentary have been called? triumph of the hair triumph of the model I don't know it's hard to say but it's all wonderful flat hat and she has it

she has that she has that hat remember from the inauguration the hat that like kind of went over her eyes yeah there's several minutes several minutes on the hat in this movie and the the moments where she is you know being a fashion model

are you know she like that's the thing she actually is best at believe it or not like understands how clothes should look good for her you know, this is a, there was that whole thing, like go woke, go broke, right? Like, well, the bottom line is all that really matters. The market decides all these.

It turns out that when you get into like illiberal regime territory, none of that profit loss stuff matters at all. All that matters is making sure that you're on the list, the good list, not the naughty list. Audience of one. Great. Well, there goes the free market. Free market. It's a wonderful thing.

Everybody, go out and see Melania this weekend and make sure that the president knows you're one of the good people and not one of the bad people because, you know, that can be dangerous in America. You don't want to wind up getting arrested or worse. Sunny, bunch of the bulwark. Thanks for being with us.

Guys, hit like, hit subscribe. We'll be back with more terrible news soon. Good luck, America.