by WorldTribune Staff, February 1, 2026 Real World News

Perhaps the best gauge from the opening of the “Melania” documentary is from Rotten Tomatoes:

• The Popcornmeter, which measures audience approval of a movie, is at 99%.
• The Tomatometer, which measures critics’ approval of a movie, is at 6%.

As President Donald Trump put it, “Melania” is a “blockbuster.”

And the Left is seething.

John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary magazine, noted: “Bad news for the obsessional culturati who have been working to establish the Melania movie as a world-historic failure and embarrassment: It’s going to make $8M in its first weekend, which is a colossal opening for a documentary.”

The biggest opening for a documentary in more than a decade.

“The Left is just going to have to cope, but you can hear the gnashing of teeth over this one,” RedState’s Nick Arama noted.

The documentary follows the first lady over the 20 days leading up to Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025, as she prepares for the swearing-in and navigates her family’s return to the White House.

Writing for The Washington Times, Valerie Richardson noted that Melania “may never receive the kid-glove legacy media treatment afforded to other first ladies, which may be why she has leapfrogged the press and communicated directly with the public through her own projects.”

Her 2024 memoir, “Melania,” was a best-seller.

The film, which cost $75 million, shows her focusing on issues such as inauguration security, a priority after the two assassination attempts on her husband’s life during the 2024 campaign, as well as the couple engaging in lighthearted banter.

“I was very involved in leading the production and choosing the trailer,” Melania said. “I want to show the people that they will see the communications and private communications between me and my husband. So that was part of it.”

Trump detractors flooded social media to bash the film, hoping to influence audiences and make it bomb at the box office. The president took to Truth Social to relay that the movie was “selling out, FAST!”

“Mrs. Trump isn’t finished,” Richardson noted. “Amazon MGM plans to follow up with a docuseries about her priorities in the White House, another first for a first lady who doesn’t play it safe.”

Breitbart’s John Nolte notes how “Melania” stacks up against some feature films, most of them acclaimed by the critics, starring A-listers?

• Domestically, Melania has already outgrossed Jennifer Lawrence’s most recent movie “Die My Love”.

• Domestically, Melania has already outgrossed the Stephen King movie “The Life of Chuck”.

• Domestically, Melania has already outgrossed the latest from a Coen brothers, Honey Don’t!”

• Melania drew a bigger opening weekend on fewer screens (1,500) than the Dwayne Johnson movie “The Smashing Machine” did on 3,345 screens.

• Melania sold more opening weekend tickets than the Benedict Cumberbatch/Olivia Colman remake of “The Roses” did on 2,700 screens.

• Melania scored a better opening weekend than the combined power of Darren Aronofsky and Austin Butler did for “Caught Stealing”, which opened on 3,578 screens.

“In fact, most of those movies got good-to-great reviews. Some even had Oscar talk swirling around them. And you can bet more than one cost a helluva lot more than the $75 million that went into ‘Melania,’ ” Nolte wrote.

Nolte added: “Finally, all this pearl-clutching over Amazon spending $75 million on Melania is total horseshit. Melania delivers the world’s two biggest superstars — Donald and Melania Trump — to Amazon Prime for $75 million. You’re going to tell me that’s a bad deal when streaming services regularly drop hundreds of millions of dollars on shitty movies starring Matt Damon and Eddie Muprhy, and on streaming series no one watches?

“Our lying, garbage media pulled out all the stops and once again whored out their credibility, hoping that a “failure narrative” would become self-fulfilling.

“Well, ha ha. Once again, the Trumps have made complete fools of the Worst People In The World. Maybe another tattoo or piercing will help them cope.”

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  Who is Melania Trump? First Lady’s side of the story is ‘blockbuster’, WorldTribune.com