Well, there's the usual proviso that any film purporting to portray real people, real events and 'what really happened' has to be taken on trust, and I have no way of knowing just how accurate or not this film is.
Game Change has been accused of being liberal propaganda but to be honest if that's the case everyone apart from La Palin herself doesn't come out of it too badly, and Ed Harris's John McCain presents us with a principled, decent and honest man. And even Palin is shown to be more out of her depth than anything else, the wrong choice despite at first seeming like the right one. Out of curiosity I watched two clips from the film (interviews with Palin) side-by-side with the real thing after a search on YouTube and, well, they were virtually identical. Some scenes, by their very nature - Palin alone with her husband Todd - have to be fiction, but yet again none actually puts the boot in Palin. What is notable, and the continuing (at the time of writing) campaigns by several men to represent the Republicans in November 2012's election is in a way pertinent, is the amount of grassroots support Palin seemed and still seems to have: there are apparently a lot of Republicans out there who prefer to call a spade a bloody shovel and can't be doing with all the sophisticated film-flammery of the Washington elite. And for them Palin was a voice, she was their woman. You might disagree - and disagree fundamentally as I do - with what she has to say, and you might even conclude that but for an engaging manner, a pretty presentable face and a team of desperate spin doctors, she might well have remained an unknown everywhere except Alaska, but you cannot, in all honesty, deny her the right to say what she says. If we have the right, then so does she.
If we deny her that right, then we shouldn't be surprised if sooner or later some crud will try to deny us that right, too. Palin dropped out of the current race quite early on, but her brand of downhome republicanism still has a lot of supporters, and it would be wise to take note of that fact. Like it or not, Palin spoke and speaks for quite a few people. She articulates for them what they would like to say but cannot themselves articulate. Perhaps liberals reading this review would have preferred that the film slags off Palin in no uncertain terms, but it doesn't. It does show her to be finally an endorsement short of the winning ticket, but I think she was that any way.
Overall, I thought Game Change is a reasonable account of part of the political process. Ed Harris, Woody Harrelson, Julianne Moore and the rest get top marks for their performances, and for me there was nothing bogus about it and, above all, the film was very entertaining. So what's there not to like about it?
Game Change has been accused of being liberal propaganda but to be honest if that's the case everyone apart from La Palin herself doesn't come out of it too badly, and Ed Harris's John McCain presents us with a principled, decent and honest man. And even Palin is shown to be more out of her depth than anything else, the wrong choice despite at first seeming like the right one. Out of curiosity I watched two clips from the film (interviews with Palin) side-by-side with the real thing after a search on YouTube and, well, they were virtually identical. Some scenes, by their very nature - Palin alone with her husband Todd - have to be fiction, but yet again none actually puts the boot in Palin. What is notable, and the continuing (at the time of writing) campaigns by several men to represent the Republicans in November 2012's election is in a way pertinent, is the amount of grassroots support Palin seemed and still seems to have: there are apparently a lot of Republicans out there who prefer to call a spade a bloody shovel and can't be doing with all the sophisticated film-flammery of the Washington elite. And for them Palin was a voice, she was their woman. You might disagree - and disagree fundamentally as I do - with what she has to say, and you might even conclude that but for an engaging manner, a pretty presentable face and a team of desperate spin doctors, she might well have remained an unknown everywhere except Alaska, but you cannot, in all honesty, deny her the right to say what she says. If we have the right, then so does she.
If we deny her that right, then we shouldn't be surprised if sooner or later some crud will try to deny us that right, too. Palin dropped out of the current race quite early on, but her brand of downhome republicanism still has a lot of supporters, and it would be wise to take note of that fact. Like it or not, Palin spoke and speaks for quite a few people. She articulates for them what they would like to say but cannot themselves articulate. Perhaps liberals reading this review would have preferred that the film slags off Palin in no uncertain terms, but it doesn't. It does show her to be finally an endorsement short of the winning ticket, but I think she was that any way.
Overall, I thought Game Change is a reasonable account of part of the political process. Ed Harris, Woody Harrelson, Julianne Moore and the rest get top marks for their performances, and for me there was nothing bogus about it and, above all, the film was very entertaining. So what's there not to like about it?