'Game Change': Sarah Palin on the verge of a nervous breakdown

Sarah Palin (Julianne Moore) in a moment of distress during HBO's "Game Change," which premieres in March. (HBO)

By James Oliphant

February 2, 2012, 12:30 p.m.

The trailer for HBO's "Game Change" is out, and it features a full dose of Julianne Moore as Sarah Palin, portraying the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee on the verge of falling apart in the closing weeks of the campaign.

The much anticipated film premieres in March. Though it uses the book by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin as source material, the movie seems to have largely jettisoned the extended conflict in 2008 between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama to more squarely focus on Palin's explosive debut on the national political stage.

In the clip, John McCain advisor Steve Schmidt, played by Woody Harrelson, tells the candidate that he needs something dramatic to alter the trajectory in his campaign, something to capture the "YouTube" 24/7 news cycle. Enter Palin, who scores with her rollicking speech at the Republican National Convention before beginning to wilt under the glare of the media spotlight.

Schmidt and McCain's team soon find to their dismay that not only is Moore-as-Palin thin on policy and disinterested in prep work, she is fiercely independent, bucking her campaign handlers at every turn. "I am not your puppet!" she barks.

The real Palin, who lately has been trying to insert herself into the GOP presidential fight between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, criticized the book when it was released for being inaccurate.

The release of the film (scheduled for four days after the "Super Tuesday" slate of GOP primaries) is likely to provoke another round of clashes between Palin's defenders and detractors. The website "Conservatives4Palin" is already on the case.

Here's the clip: