"Where's My Roy Cohn?" - a movie review - ✯✯✯✯✯

Watching the documentary "Where's My Roy Cohn?" is like watching a martial arts film. Cohn is the Grand Master. Behind his serene mask of a tanned face and pale blue eyes lurks, as the narrator says, a caged animal who, when released, attacks. Trump studied under Cohn. He learned Cohn's moves well but beneath Trump's orange mask lurks nothing. Cohn was a bully who bullied and won; Trump is a bully who gives in and calls it winning, then plays golf.

Matt Trynauer's film is a beautiful piece of movie making. He has edited together scenes of Roy Cohn in his very public life as an attorney, a socialite and a political fixer. Cohn was the only child of a wealthy Jewish couple in the Bronx. He went to Columbia Law School and graduated at 20. He was admitted to the New York bar when he turned 21, and went to work as a prosecutor for the US attorney in Manhattan. At age 23 he prosecuted the Rosenbergs for selling information about the atomic bomb to the Russians. Years after Ethel Rosenberg died in the electric chair, Roy Cohn was asked if how he felt about the questionable execution and he said, "I'd have thrown the switch myself." Both Cohn - the prosecutor - and the Judge for the Rosenberg case were Jewish to reduce the risk of a charge of anti-semitism.

Most notably Roy Cohn was known as the attorney for Joe McCarthy and HUAC. With his advice McCarthy attacked Communists in government and the military as hidden enemies of America. They went on to remove homosexuals from government as well arguing that they were under risk of being blackmailed in anyone found out. In the fifties homosexuality was considered a mental illness. Cohn himself was homosexual but never came out of the closet inspire of dying of AIDs in 1986.

The point of the film is Roy Cohn's technique for winning legal cases: never admit wrong doing, always attack those who attack you, and do whatever you need to do to win including lying and circumventing the rule of law. In 1973 Cohn was the attorney for both the Trump organization and for  John Gotti, the Mafia don. The Trumps may have been introduced to the Cohn by the Mafia leaders who were heavily involved in the construction trades in New York City, especially concrete. Trump tower was built with concrete rather than structural steel. The Trumps were being sued by the Federal Government for racial discrimination. They refused to allow people of color to rent their apartments. Cohn helped them settle the case but Trump did not abide by the courts ruling and was taken back to court for the same issues in 1978. As for Gotti, Cohn got him a 4 year sentence of which he served 2 years. After this Cohn represented many of the Mafia criminals.

Donald Trump learned Cohn's techniques for resolving conflict to your best advantage. We see it over and over in Trump's specious, repetitive arguments: fake news, attacking opponents, counter law suits, never admitting wrongdoing, and when all else fails - lie and circumvent the law.

The film also contains scenes of Cohn at home. In his bedroom he had a large collection of toy frogs including several large stuffed ones. In public he wore suits but at home he wore a dressing gown, had fur blankets on his bed and was always attended by a male secretary who took business dictation while Cohn lounged on the bed. Seeing these scenes gave me some sympathy for this man whose life was so hidden and hypocritical. Being a Jew he was selected to prosecute the Jewish Rosenbergs. As a closeted homosexual he prosecuted homosexuals. At home he wore a dressing gown; in public a suit. In a later era he could have worn his dressing gown in public and, perhaps, have been a happier and kinder man.