If you believe the Sith, there are always two, and only two: a master and an apprentice. Director Ali Abassi (Border, Holy Spider) and screenwriter and journalist Gabriel Sherman seem keen to reduce the evolution of Donald Trump to this two-hander, to understand just how one of the most significant political figures of the twenty-first century came to be the man he is today. In the process they fail to discover anything beneath the glossy surface of Trump’s barely-constructed façade, but maybe that’s the point; if it is, it’s a not wholly satisfying one.

In The Apprentice, we track the relationship between nascent businessman Trump (Sebastian Stan) and his future advocate and mentor, lawyer Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), from their first meeting at a restaurant in New York City. Trump is at this stage shy and blustering, wanting to step out of his father’s footsteps and become a powerful entrepreneur but mired in doorstepping clients for overdue rent in his existing properties. In Cohn he instantly sees someone who can open doors, clear pathways and allow Trump’s vision of a shining tower at the centre of an almost-bankrupt Manhattan to become a reality. But his faith in Cohn’s abilities, as great as they are, may be overstated.

Cohn’s tactics are simple: get on the front foot with constant attack, never admit culpability or wrongdoing and never, ever, admit that you’ve lost. His methods range from unconventional to illegal, but he’s become a significant figure in New York City and in Trump he sees the potential for someone who could offer him even greater influence. He’s willing to work for Donald without being concerned about receiving an initial fee as he sees greater benefits to be had, but others with whom the future president is attempting to strike deals are less forgiving.

It would be easy for any portrayal of Donald Trump to descend rapidly into caricature, given that there’s an argument that the former president has actually achieved that transition in real life. Sebastian Stan avoids that, and while it would be difficult to argue that his portrayal is nuanced, the more confident, self-assured Donald gradually appears before brashness and arrogance take over. Where The Apprentice is successful is in detailing the gradual transformation into the vain, vacuous businessman, a Trump more concerned with scalp tucks and belly fat being sucked than he is with the well-being of his family or colleagues.

What’s less successful is the transition the other way. Jeremy Strong is a bullish presence from the start, setting out the paradigm for Trump to follow, one which lacks in compassion and is all about success at any cost. When his Frankenstein starts to become a victim of the monster he’s created, he’s surprised at the consequences, but Sherman’s script cuts him out at a time when he was succumbing to AIDS (something he claimed to his dying day was liver cancer). Due to the lack of any available empathy for Cohn’s corrupt advocate, the contrasts between Trump and his mentor and their respective paths don’t quite carry the weight that they could have done.

Like the majority of biopics, The Apprentice may be – ironically – liberal with the truth, or at least find convenience in reveals, such as a gift of cufflinks from Trump to Cohn which turn out to be worthless, a neat summation of their relationship. More problematically, some of the script’s tightening to focus the relationship between Trump and Cohn excludes some of the potential influence of the businessman’s family, and simplifies the relationship between Donald and his father Fred (Martin Donovan). What could have been an exploration of the more varied nature of the composition of Donnie’s psyche feels like it’s been lost within that streamlining.

Sherman also can’t find anything more than surface in the relationship between Trump and his first wife Ivanka (Maria Bakalova). She’s easy on the eye, but not easy enough as Trump seeks her, then attempts to mould her before eventually getting bored of her. Their relationship is one-note and doesn’t offer any additional insights into Trump, other than he’s a terrible person wrapped in a sheath of self-interest at the expense of everyone around him.

Director Ali Abassi has delivered more intrigue and nuance in his previous films; while never quite in awe of his subject, The Apprentice often feels as if it’s just ticking boxes, lining up the facts we know about the man who will be president and painting a gaudy picture of the weathered skin, rather than getting under it. Thanks to its leading man, there’s entertainment to be had on the journey and Stan’s performance is commendable, finding the limited shading available in a man who became the leader of the free world. There is, though, an inevitable feeling that something more scathingly satirical or nuanced and insightful was there for the taking; what’s left is perhaps a damning indictment because of its lack of depth, and while entertaining is ultimately unfulfilling.

The Apprentice screened at the London Film Festival 2024, it’s out in UK cinemas now