May the Odds be Ever in Your Favor.

However many years in the however distant future, North America has evolved (or devolved?) into the world of Panem, a society made up of 12 Districts ruled by a morally corrupt sadistic government based out of a place called simply The Capitol. To keep status quo, each year the Capitol organizes a televised event in which children fight to the death in an elaborately designed landscape arena. This event is known, of course, as “The Hunger Games.” Each District must offer up two “tributes,” a male and female between the ages of 12 and 18, to participate in the games. As our heroine, Katniss Everdeen, succinctly describes, “There are 24 of us. Only one comes out.”

Gary Ross’s film adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ beloved book succeeds on almost all counts, in some cases exceeding expectations. It is clear from the first several frames that Ross expects his audience to understand the difference between reading about brutal violence on the page and seeing it on a big screen. When we are reading through the voice of Katniss Everdeen, it is easy to forget just how young these competitors are. However, in the film, when the horn blows for the games to begin and the audience is launched into a frenzied (eerily un-scored) montage of absolute carnage, we are reminded that this is nothing short of a horrific, disturbing ordeal in which there truly are no winners.

Jennifer Lawrence is commendable in her portrayal of District 12’s tribute, Katniss Everdeen. With a character who, in the novel often verges on tedium, Lawrence chooses to highlight Katniss’s discomfort with her sudden fame, making her both likable and mysterious. As her counterpart in the games and would-be love interest, Josh Hutcherson is sweet but supremely capable as Peeta Mellark. Peeta is a character who could easily be given the “boy next door” treatment, but Hutcherson gives him a pragmatism and honesty that present him as a young man who understands there is more at stake than his life, and that his identity is the one thing he really can’t afford to lose. Whether it’s for show or for real, the chemistry between Lawrence and Hutcherson gives the film its heart.

The story has its obvious commentary on 21st Century media. Ross takes this and runs with it to great effect. The entire film is essentially shot like a reality TV show, relying heavily on the use of hand-held cameras and staggered close-ups, making the audience feel a part of the crowd watching the games themselves (though not in an accusatory sense, per se). Perhaps it was my imagination, but throughout the film there even seemed to be winks at its dystopian science fiction predecessors, with certain designs uncannily evoking Truffaut’s 1966 adaptation of Fahrenheit 451. One thing is for sure, Gary Ross has achieved a rare feat: creating a film that is at once both a mega-blockbuster as well as a sophisticated piece of filmmaking.

"I just don't want to let John down."

Many people, myself included, approached the idea of the Game Change film with slight wariness, an attitude of “too soon” surrounding the whole project. However, in looking at the political landscape in this current election, it is perhaps more necessary than ever that we are given a reminder of what it was like the last time around.

The film is ultimately quite even-handed in its portrayal of Sarah Palin. This is thanks entirely to the performance of Julianne Moore. Moore has built her career on playing characters that can perhaps best be referred to as the “Complicated American Woman” (see The Hours or Far From Heaven) and within minutes of this film, it becomes impossible to imagine such a sensitive role in the hands of any other actress. For Tina Fey, playing Palin was mainly about getting the voice down. For Moore, it is about finding where Sarah Palin, the woman, ends and where Palin the frightened child begins.

Indeed, the dynamic established between Palin and the majority of the McCain staff (particularly Steve Schmidt and Nicolle Wallace) is akin to that between cautious parents and a petulant daughter. She is frequently referred to as “poor girl” by Ed Harris’s John McCain, and in one scene where she is essentially giving her advisers the silent treatment, Schmidt (a captivating Woody Harrelson) appeals to her as one would an insecure teenage girl, commenting on how he is concerned at her weight loss and that she should give up her no-carb diet.

Whether it’s because of our own proximity to the 2008 election or because of our national perspective on the event itself (after all, we know how the film ends before it begins), it is truly not possible to watch this and offer any sincere mea culpa about how rigorously she was criticized throughout the McCain campaign. That said, the film does not necessarily ask this of us. Instead, we are asked only to understand that this woman quite simply should never have been chosen for this position. To this end, we are able to pity her.

As far as any “bias” goes within the film-making itself (and I admit I do not have enough background knowledge on the production process and cannot speak to sources beyond the book) the most glaring point of contention is that, through its portrayal of McCain’s staff, it seems to suggest that the selection of Sarah Palin was the sole mistake made in the entire McCain campaign. It does include references to the week in which McCain postponed debates in order to return to Washington and deal with the economy, as well as the increasingly harsh rhetoric used toward the end of the campaign, but even in these instances, the blame is either placed on others or disregarded entirely.

By the end of the film, we have not been led to “like” Sarah Palin. But we do find ourselves with a better understanding of who she was, and how the American population responded to, and in some senses manipulated, the image she presented. There are moments where even the film itself is willing to poke fun. The conversation between Palin and Steve Schmidt over the pronunciation of “Biden” (as opposed to “O’Biden, as Palin kept saying) borders on Abbot and Costello routine.

However, as stated, this film does prove that we have gained enough distance from the 2008 election that we are at least able to feel sorry for her. As Palin watches in silent humiliation while Tina Fey and Amy Poehler lambaste her Katie Couric interview, I admit that a part of me just wanted to step in and tell her to change the damn channel.