# Wag the Dog (1997)

### reviewed by
George Wilcox

CLICK ON CAROLINE. Dear Caroline Film Reviews: http://www.geocites.com/Hollywood/Studio/7066

    Wag the Dog

    Dear Caroline --

Here's a movie, director Barry Levinson's latest filmed in just 29 days, that takes Ivan Reitman's "Dave" to another extreme.

Co-written by former Chicagoan David Mamet, it's a dark comedy about how White House aides and spin doctors manipulate the news for the sake of saving their jobs and their president's image. Presumably, not in that order.

    It's Ed Rollins meets Robert Evans.

Rollins was Ronald Reagan's bearded campaign manager, a master at images such as the "Evil Empire," and Evans is the perpetually tanned producer ("Chinatown") and former Paramount studio boss ("Love Story" and "The Godfather").

Robert De Niro stars as Conrad Brean, the professorial-looking spin doctor known as Mr. Fix It, who is brought into the White House for an emergency when the President is caught in a sexual molestation scandal involving a Firefly girl less than two weeks before the election.

In a meeting held deep in the White House basement, on a set right out of Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove," Brean introduces the non-existant B-3 Bomber and orders the President to become ill while in China for a trade mission. The point? Take the focus off the Firefly girl scandal by getting the media to focus on something else.

Brean, along with presidential aide Winifred Ames (Ann Heche), travels to L.A. to meet with Hollywood producer Stanley Motss (Dustin Hoffman). Brean needs Motss' help to engineer a fake war with Albania.

The film, based on Larry Beinhart's novel "American Hero," has many targets to spoof from Grenada to the Persian Gulf War, to yellow ribbons, "We Are the World," and country singer Lee Greenwood.

Motss brings in his own crew of spin doctors, including songwriter John Dean (Willie Nelson), the Fad King (Denis Leary) and fashion guru Liz (Andrea Martin).

In small performances, Kirsten Dunst plays a girl caught in war-torn Albania and Woody Harrelson is a freaked-out war hero.

It seemed appropriate "Primary Colors" starring John Travolta was among the trailers, another story about spin doctors manipulating a presidential election inspired by Joe Klein's (aka Anonymous) novel based on the Clinton campaign.

"Wag the Dog" features crackerjack dialogue and engaging performances by De Niro and Hoffman. The film's only troubles occur in the final 30 minutes when the story turns surreal, almost too good to be true. Maybe that's just the point Levinson was trying to make. That everything about politics is too good to be true.

It's a fun romp for true cynics about the politic process. I think even Jefferson Smith would laugh.

    Rating: Three stars

    Thinking of you,
    Geo. M. Wilcox

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