efilmcritic Review - "Wag the Dog"

[Doreen Peri]

I loved this flick! I saw it about 6 months ago or so. Maybe a year. Definitely worth renting.

As we watched it, I said, "My GOD! It's just like real life! They're staging the politics! They're making it all up!"

Does anyone have any comments about this film and how it relates to today's media representation of the news? I was just listening to Barry Levinson on NPR talking about the film and it inspired me to look up a review and post it.

Strange... it doesn't say who wrote the review. *sigh* I did an arbitrary search and there are many more reviews of this film out there.

Clearly, this one was written a while back. I'd like to read a review of this film written more recently, comparing what's happening now with the presidential reelection campaign. If anyone finds a more recent review, let me know.

Your thoughts?

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http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?m ... viewer=235

"Wag the Dog" (1997)

Directed By: Barry Levinson

Cast - Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, Anne Heche, Willie Nelson, William H. Macy

It took Barry Levinson 29 days and $15 million to film this little fucker, and man, what a payoff. A dead-on satire with prophetic proportions and which has cast a spell in my views of politics afterwards, Wag The Dog is close to perfect, bending and crossing the barrier of fiction and reality to such extent that you start wondering as you laugh, could this really happen? Well, it did, and to a certain extent, it is still happening.

The President of the United States has been involved in a scandal when a Firefly Girl Scout accuses him of sexual harassment when she and her troops were visiting the White House. It’s even worse since its two weeks before Election Day and such news could be disastrous in the President’s campaign for reelection, so Presidential Adviser Winfried Ames (Anne Heche) decides to go and seek the advice of political consultant/spin doctor Conrad Brean (Robert De Niro) to get the president out of this mess. First Brean insists on fabricating denials from nonexistent emergencies (B-3 Bomber, B-3 WHAT?) and then, he decides to hire credit-hungry movie producer Stanley Motss (Dustin Hoffman) so he can help him fabricate a war against the nation of Albania so that the focus (and the patriotism) of the people be on the war rather than the President’s affairs. Motss recruits a creative team to start the fabrication process, among them screenwriter Liz Butsky (Andrea Martin), trendsetter Fad King (Dennis Leary) and songwriter Johnny Dean (Willie Nelson), and start centering the scam all around supposed “American Hero” (but psychotic military prisoner about to explode) William Schumann (Woody Harrelson). The whole scheme is treated like an advertising campaign and plays like clockwork… that is, unless a few run-ins with the CIA and several glitches during the entire process follow, which force all three masterminds to improvise their best they can to keep the story going to keep the public distracted so that the President can win the reelection.

Enough of the prophetic things that this film would cause once Bill Clinton got caught red-handed with celebrity whore Monica Lewinski. This is one exceptionally well-made film. The story is highly original, with some tips of the hat given to Network and Broadcast News. Sure, there are several plot elements (like Johnny Dean’s scenes) that seem ridiculous, and in fact they are but they are so well manufactured into the screenplay’s twists and turns and into the scam that it makes it believable, which makes it absolutely hilarious, but at the same time, shocking. Why shocking, because its those same things that can be found in our own society, or just sitting there waiting on the edge for somebody to push them off the cliff and into the void of reality. Satire of course has never been more present in this film, ridiculing every aspect of our society and it’s views of the media of how we buy whatever shit there is on television, and also the much plausibility that this film includes that are not so far from real life (enter Clinton/Lewinski). It’s present in our world. Clinton was fucked over Lewinski, what does he do? Sends air raids to Kosovo, and even wanted to send troops in Kosovo. Does anyone other than the well-educated American know where the fuck Kosovo is? Doesn’t this plot ring the bell to anyone? Not only this, Henkin’s and Mamet’s screenplay as well as Barry Levinson’s direction is so effective on this film that they manage to blend the lines of what is real and what is fiction, and it comes to a point where you can’t distinguish one from the other. You’ll laugh at it, but you’ll also be shocked by it, since in the end, you’ll realize that you’re only laughing at yourself, and laughing at the whole world that surrounds you. As I would say, filmmaking at it’s best. The ending was somewhat anti-climatic, and it kind of ran out of steam, but it’s understandable and in the end, the experience as a whole, was compelling and hilarious.

Not only the film works because of screenwriting and direction, the acting stable must also live up the job, and they do. Dustin Hoffman is hilarious and very, very believable as the credit-hungry movie producer Stanley Motss and delivers it with style, with some classic one-liners that will make the trivia. Robert De Niro is a little laid-back, but still manages to pull off very decently in his role. Anne Heche was fucking hot, and she manages a good performance, but man she’s just red hot. Another broad standout is Woody Harrelson as the psychotic rapist-turned-hero William Schumann, which is essentially a cameo but still, its one of the most hilarious parts of the film. Some people actually criticized this part since it brought up rape as comedy. I don’t think the film’s intentions were never that, but more of the fact that they chose a psychotic rapist to be a hero, that’s what made it funny. Willie Nelson seems out of place and an odd choice, but I guess it was the odd the reason they casted him since I was laughing my ass off every time he came up.

In the end, go rent this film. It’s an enjoyable satire, and a very funny one, but also one with an important message that everyone should learn from. It’s definitely one of the finest films to come out in 1997. See it.

(c) efilmcritic.com (I assume... didn't notice a copyright notice)

[stilltrucking]

Osam Bin Laden Clinton went after him about the time the movie came out, an air strike or something that just missed and all the movie fans said it was just a case a wag the dog to take our minds off of monica

It was a good flick.

probably the movie I have seen in the past year that I keep watching over and over is Life Is Beautiful, i have watched about four times in Italian, could not understand a word but it sounded better than english. I like the facist art work too, the square jawed poster of the duce.