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#465 - Wag the Dog
Barry Levinson, 1997
A clandestine spin doctor teams up with a renowned Hollywood producer in order to create a fictitious war in order to cover up a presidential sex scandal and ensure his re-election.
Despite its occasional dip into darker comedy, it's funny how quaint Wag the Dog seems in the wake of subsequent political satires like The Thick of It and its feature-length spin-off In the Loop, which also mined the concept of spin doctors and the more disturbing implications of their jobs for comedic gold (especially considering how both the Levinson film and the BBC sitcom focus on the experts running around behind-the-scenes without ever actually showing the chief executive that they're trying to protect, though Wag the Dog does cheat a bit by having a brief seen-from-behind televised appearance). Even so, Wag the Dog still takes an extremely absurd premise and manages to make it seem extremely feasible within the otherwise realistic world depicted here. The film introduces us to Robert de Niro's frumpy-looking "Mr. Fix-It" whose air of matter-of-fact geniality disguises a rather cunning and manipulative figure responsible for keeping the government running as smoothly as possible no matter what kind of obstacles pop up. When the President is caught up in an extremely damaging sex scandal less than two weeks before election day, de Niro decides to seek out the help of a veteran film producer (Dustin Hoffman) in order to help him stage a fictional war with Albania so as to distract both the media and the public from the scandal. Hoffman readily agrees simply because it sounds like fun. They use all sorts of tricks in order to try to keep attention on the Albanian conflict even as many other players - from the C.I.A. to the man they choose to play their "war hero" - threaten to undermine the ruse for whatever reason.
Though it's arguably been improved upon by other films covering similar material, Wag the Dog still holds up just fine on its own. Hoffman and de Niro make for good leads that complement each other nicely, while the rest of the cast turn in decent (though frequently brief) performances. Anne Heche may be the weak link in the cast as she gets little else to do but play de Niro's beleagured offsider, but she's amply propped up by actors like William H. Macy and Woody Harrelson (the latter of whom steals every frame he's in). This even extends to Willie Nelson, who I thought was supposed to be playing himself but was in fact playing a completely fictitious country singer put in charge of composing the war's official protest song. Much like that particular moment, there are plenty of clever jabs at both Hollywood and the mainstream media, such as Hoffman's perfectionist tendencies interfering with the team's attempts to falsify footage of wartorn Albania using a blue screen and a bag of potato chips (complete with noticeably generic stock screams, which I think makes it better) and the fact that the media actually sells it to a public who buys it ("I didn't know Jim Belushi was Albanian!"). There are also enough twists to the plot to not only keep it from getting stale but also in exposing just how audacious the lies can get, especially when the decision to invent an American war hero yields some darkly amusing consequences. Ultimately, the only real problem with Wag the Dog is that it is clever more so than it is funny and, despite some still-trenchant commentary on the 24-hour news cycle and the people who constantly seek to manipulate it for their own gain, it's not a major classic either. An important and reasonably influential piece, to be sure, but you can definitely see how it's been improved upon since its release.
Barry Levinson, 1997
A clandestine spin doctor teams up with a renowned Hollywood producer in order to create a fictitious war in order to cover up a presidential sex scandal and ensure his re-election.
Despite its occasional dip into darker comedy, it's funny how quaint Wag the Dog seems in the wake of subsequent political satires like The Thick of It and its feature-length spin-off In the Loop, which also mined the concept of spin doctors and the more disturbing implications of their jobs for comedic gold (especially considering how both the Levinson film and the BBC sitcom focus on the experts running around behind-the-scenes without ever actually showing the chief executive that they're trying to protect, though Wag the Dog does cheat a bit by having a brief seen-from-behind televised appearance). Even so, Wag the Dog still takes an extremely absurd premise and manages to make it seem extremely feasible within the otherwise realistic world depicted here. The film introduces us to Robert de Niro's frumpy-looking "Mr. Fix-It" whose air of matter-of-fact geniality disguises a rather cunning and manipulative figure responsible for keeping the government running as smoothly as possible no matter what kind of obstacles pop up. When the President is caught up in an extremely damaging sex scandal less than two weeks before election day, de Niro decides to seek out the help of a veteran film producer (Dustin Hoffman) in order to help him stage a fictional war with Albania so as to distract both the media and the public from the scandal. Hoffman readily agrees simply because it sounds like fun. They use all sorts of tricks in order to try to keep attention on the Albanian conflict even as many other players - from the C.I.A. to the man they choose to play their "war hero" - threaten to undermine the ruse for whatever reason.
Though it's arguably been improved upon by other films covering similar material, Wag the Dog still holds up just fine on its own. Hoffman and de Niro make for good leads that complement each other nicely, while the rest of the cast turn in decent (though frequently brief) performances. Anne Heche may be the weak link in the cast as she gets little else to do but play de Niro's beleagured offsider, but she's amply propped up by actors like William H. Macy and Woody Harrelson (the latter of whom steals every frame he's in). This even extends to Willie Nelson, who I thought was supposed to be playing himself but was in fact playing a completely fictitious country singer put in charge of composing the war's official protest song. Much like that particular moment, there are plenty of clever jabs at both Hollywood and the mainstream media, such as Hoffman's perfectionist tendencies interfering with the team's attempts to falsify footage of wartorn Albania using a blue screen and a bag of potato chips (complete with noticeably generic stock screams, which I think makes it better) and the fact that the media actually sells it to a public who buys it ("I didn't know Jim Belushi was Albanian!"). There are also enough twists to the plot to not only keep it from getting stale but also in exposing just how audacious the lies can get, especially when the decision to invent an American war hero yields some darkly amusing consequences. Ultimately, the only real problem with Wag the Dog is that it is clever more so than it is funny and, despite some still-trenchant commentary on the 24-hour news cycle and the people who constantly seek to manipulate it for their own gain, it's not a major classic either. An important and reasonably influential piece, to be sure, but you can definitely see how it's been improved upon since its release.