One of Donald Trump’s most vocal haters is the actor and film-festival founder Robert De Niro, a man who once called the insurrection-adjacent failed incumbent the star of a “tragic dumbass comedy.” Two weeks after a bleeped-out interview on The View that warned voters against Trump, De Niro formalizes his objection to the former president vis-à-vis an official Joe Biden reelection campaign ad titled “Snapped.” He lends his voice to the 30-second spot, lambasting Trump for his social-media addiction, idiotic statements, and disregard for the Bill of Rights. “From midnight tweets to drinking bleach, to tear-gassing citizens and staging a photo op, we knew Trump was out of control when he was president,” De Niro narrates. “Then he lost the 2020 election and snapped.”
Aesthetically, the ad is eating off Succession’s plate. It employs a soundtrack full of stressed-out, dissonant violins and an editing style that recalls the tragic dumbass comedy’s opening credits, down to the font choice. Claiming Trump is “threatening to be a dictator” and to “terminate the Constitution,” or else there will be a “bloodbath,” De Niro ends by saying the most politically successful reality-TV star wants “revenge … and he’ll stop at nothing to get it.” If only he had ended the whole thing by saying Trump is “not serious people.”
