Campaigns are hard. They are time consuming and cost tons of money. And you could still lose. That's exactly what happened in 2008 for Arizona Senator John McCain (Ed Harris).
He managed to talk Political Analyst Steve Schmidt (Woody Harrelson) into advising his campaign and things turn around for him. But then it is time for McCain and his team to pick his running mate. He wants Joe Lieberman, but this is immediately nixed as it will lose support for him not gain it. Instead, Schmidt feels that a woman will give him the best chance. He settles on Alaskan governor, Sarah Palin (Julianne Moore). She accepts the offer. Her life has forever changed.
Palin is certainly a Republican and focused mom of five. And she seems average enough, wearing a sweatshirt and blue jeans when she takes her kids to a community fair. She is also staunchly pro-life, never mind if the pregnancy is from rape or incest or will endanger the mother's life. She opposes stem-cell research but promises to put aside her differences to support John McCain's point of view.
Though word didn't leak about this announcement and at first, it seems like Palin is the right choice. She relates well to people and they love her but it quickly becomes clear that she is the wrong pick for Washington. She knows almost nothing about foreign policy, believing the Queen of England is the head of the government, which isn't true. She believes that Hussein was responsible for 9/11 not Al-Qaeda. The background research down on her wasn't enough, not at all. And her husband was a member of the Alaskan Independence Movement, a group with the sole mission of getting Alaska out of the union. Former White House Correspondent Nicholle Wallace (Sarah Paulson) tries, in vain, to prep her for interviews. But Sarah just misses her family, including her son, fighting for his country, pregnant teenage daughter and infant son with Down Syndrome. Her interview with Katie Couric is an epic disaster, turning her into the fodder of Saturday Night Live and the criticism of the nation.
Fortunately, spending some time with her family and husband, Todd (David Barry Gary) gets her back on track. And her debate with Joe Biden is an amazing comeback for her, but something changes. She seems to be advancing her own agenda which severely hurts the campaign. She can't believe that the group has surrendered Michigan to Obama and she refuses to do a commercial about supporting stem-cell research even though she promised to back McCain's viewpoints. She won't make an appearance with someone who is pro-choice and she is furious when she finds out how much the clothes they dressed her in actually cost.
And then, when the inevitable happens, instead of following centuries of tradition, she prepares a speech praising McCain and everything he has done for this country. Fortunately, she doesn't deliver this speech. Schmidt and Wallace take pride that in forty-eight hours, no one will know her name. That's not true, though her popularity has massively died down.
The story has a frame of an interview between Schmidt and Anderson Cooper. Cooper asks if he regrets his decision of asking Palin to be Vice President. He just answers that you can't go back and change things, meaning yes, he made the wrong decision and it cost McCain the campaign.
The film is also pretty darn accurate according to the real Schmidt and Wallace who actually watched the film. McCain and Palin did not. Some of the lines are ones that I remember from the campaign. It is terrifying that a woman like Palin could have been just a heartbeat away from the Presidency.
As for the production, it is fantastic. Moore fully deserved her Emmy and all the other awards she won. Harrelson, Harris and Paulson are also brilliant. Paulson's best scene is where she sobs to Schmidt saying that she didn't vote. She just couldn't.
I can't believe the make-up artists weren't nominated for an Emmy because Moore and Harris are basically unrecognizable, fully and completely looking like their real life counterparts. Moore easily looks a decade older than his actual age while Moore looks several years younger. She even writes with her right hand as Palin is right-handed. (Moore is left-handed in real life.) And she nails the voice.
The film doesn't do any favors to Palin. She thought she made the right decision but she had no clue how cruel people could be and should have thought more before changing her life. It shows how easily the media can eat a person alive and how the education system can fail a person. It also shows that America loves celebrities, but these celebrities need the smarts to back up the position they seek. It shows how devastating taking a risk can be in something so precarious to begin with. And it shows what happens when you regret a decision that you can't change. Grade: A
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