With everyone understanding that the chances of Donald Trump defeating Kamala Harris are a lot less likely than indicated a few weeks ago (if not flat-out unlikely), surely the theatrical + streaming distribution of Ali Abassi‘s The Apprentice, the Cannes-premiered movie about the conflicted relationship between young Trump and the demonic Roy Cohn, is now regarded as a far less risky proposition.

The film has apparently been acquired by Tom Ortenberg‘s Briarcliff Entertainment, and given the presumed likelihood of The Apprentice surfacing by sometime in the early fall (late September or October, I’m guessing, not to mention a rumored appearance next weekend in a little town in Colorado), I’m kind of wondering why a trailer hasn’t been seen.

Ortenberg obviously knows that as dramatically sturdy and engrossing as the film is with stellar co-lead performances by Sebastian Stan (Trump) and Jeremy Strong (Cohn), there’s not much commercial potential if the film is released after the 11.5 election. The clock is ticking. Surely the Harris-Walz ascendancy has emboldened Ortenberg and his backers.

The Apprentice is not so much a lacerating Trump hit piece as a fascinating, well-crafted character-driven drama. Well-written, finely acted realism. It doesn’t portray Trump in especially flattering terms, granted, but it’s not an assassination either. He’s actually portrayed as moderately, half-sympathetically human during the first half.