Filmmakers find a special fascination in Steve Bannon, the scarlet-faced neofascist who spearheaded far-right web site Breitbart News and cleared the Trump campaign’s path to the White House. He was the focus of Errol Morris’ latest feature American Dharma, and now, another documentary trains its lens on the political agent.
Alison Klayman, director of Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, selected a more contemptible and yet equally un-remorseful subject for her film The Brink – the trailer for which is now online. Never being sorry is Steve Bannon’s whole schtick.
The trailer follows him as he rises through the ranks of the Trump team, though he finds that success in that arena only brings further, bang-your-head-against-the-wall frustration. He then expands his reach by linking up with global leaders inclined to sympathize with his anti-immigrant and anti-refugee sentiments flown under the banner of nationalism. (Oh, look, it’s Nigel Farage!)
Any efforts to coax a glimmer of humanity out from his crassly opportunistic exterior has been in vain. When Klayman grills him, “Are you now consulting for the National Rally Party?” his only response comes, “And your point?”
American politics is a nasty business, so perhaps it’s only fitting that its new avatar would be a man like Steve Bannon. As the trailer shows, he’s still getting the last laugh.
The Brink comes to theaters in the US on 29 March.
Published 12 Mar 2019
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