Impressions of HBO’s Game Change

Wow, Sarah Palin is an idiot.  Just in case you didn’t think that before and/or you didn’t realize how big of an idiot she is, the docudrama Game Change spells it out for you nice and clear.  In fact, the movie makes her out to be such a dolt that if any of her stupidity was enhanced in any way it might be illegal for slandering her.

The movie centers around Steve (Woody Harrelson) who plays the main campaign strategist for John McCain (played by Ed Harris) as he prepares for the 2008 election.  Eventually Steve convinces McCain to put Sarah Palin (Julianne Moore) on the election ballot as his vice presidential candidate.  From there on the movie becomes a journey through Palin’s idiocy and lies.

Remember this is an HBO Movie, which means it’s not quite good enough to get released on screen but it is far and away better quality (taking a look at the cast clearly states this) than your average TV movie.  The acting is good for the most part.  Woody is Woody.  Harris isn’t really in it, and when he is he somehow comes off as an almost grandfather type figure (which seems odd).  Then of course there’s Moore trying to humanize a woman that is best known for the Saturday Night Live skits that spoofed her (in which Tina Fey took the role of Palin).  The skits actually appear in the movie, much to the chagrin of Moore’s Palin.

While the movie does try to play up the fact that Steve really botched the whole information gathering and vetting process it ends up falling to the background because anything Palin does is simply jaw dropping (in a bad way).  It is fairly slanted against Palin, although if most of the material is plucked straight from real life you can’t really blame the writers.  The movie even tries to hammer home some of her positives (basically being good in front of crowds, being a good “actress”, and connecting with the people) and even an excuse for Palin’s behavior (depression/severe emotional problems), her negatives so far overshadow her positives that it actually becomes a sort of joke.  The movie eventually becomes ridiculous overreactions by all of the McCain campaign staffers whenever Palin doesn’t blow it (either in debates, speeches, or interviews) where everyone cheers as if everyone’s favorite team just scored the winning TD in the Super Bowl.  In any case it is worth a watch just so you can wipe your brow in relief that this woman did not end up becoming the Vice President.

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