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Wag the Dog
Sign in to save1997 film by Barry Levinson
OverviewAI-generated
Wag the Dog is a 1997 American comedy drama film directed by Barry Levinson. The screenplay was written by Hilary Henkin and David Mamet, with Mark Knopfler composing the music. The cast includes Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, Anne Heche, and Denis Leary. Production was handled by New Line Cinema, Tribeca Productions, Baltimore Pictures, and Punch Productions, with Barry Levinson and Robert De Niro serving as producers. Robert Richardson was the director of photography, and Stu Linder edited the film.
Set in Washington, D.C., the movie has a runtime of 97 minutes and was originally in English. It was distributed by New Line Cinema and is available on Netflix via video on demand. The film received the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor and Academy Award for Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay. It is part of the Museum of Modern Art collection.
The film had a budget of $15,000,000 and generated $64,256,513 in revenue. Its tagline is "A comedy about truth, justice and other special effects." Review scores include 7.4/10, 86%, and 74/100, while IMDb lists a rating of 7.1 based on 93,571 votes. TMDb reports a vote average of 6.938 from 1,054 votes.
Synthesized by Vinony from 40 facts across 4 sources: Wikidata, TMDb, IMDb, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.
Film · TMDB
6.9During the final weeks of a presidential race, the President is accused of sexual misconduct. To distract the public until the election, the President's adviser hires a Hollywood producer to help him stage a fake war.
Cast
- Dustin Hoffman as Stanley Motss
- Robert De Niro as Conrad Brean
- Anne Heche as Winifred Ames
- Woody Harrelson as Sergeant William Schumann
- Denis Leary as Fad King
- Willie Nelson as Johnny Dean
Themes
- gulf war
- central intelligence agency (cia)
- rape
- usa president
- washington dc, usa
- government
- war veteran
- election campaign
- presidential election
- staging
This product uses the TMDB API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDB.
Key facts
- Directed by
- Barry Levinson
- Screenplay by
- Hilary Henkin David Mamet
- Based on
- American Hero , 1993 novel, by Larry Beinhart
- Produced by
- Barry Levinson Robert De Niro Jane Rosenthal
- Starring
- Dustin Hoffman Robert De Niro Anne Heche Denis Leary Willie Nelson Andrea Martin Kirsten Dunst
- Cinematography
- Robert Richardson
- Edited by
- Stu Linder
- Music by
- Mark Knopfler
- Production companies
- Baltimore Pictures TriBeCa Productions
- Distributed by
- New Line Cinema
- Release dates
- December 17, 1997 ( 1997-12-17 ) ( Century City ) December 25, 1997 ( 1997-12-25 ) (United States)
- Running time
- 97 minutes
- Country
- United States
- Language
- English
- Budget
- $15 million
- Box office
- $64.3 million
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- film
- Genre
- comedy drama
- Country of origin
- United States
- Original language
- English language
- Collection
- Museum of Modern Art
- Director
- Barry Levinson
- Screenwriter
- David Mamet
- Composer
- Mark Knopfler
- Producer
- Robert De Niro
- Production company
- New Line Cinema
- Cinematographer
- Robert Richardson
- Narrative location
- Washington, D.C.
- Duration
- 97
- FilmAffinity ID
- 194582
- Distribution format
- video on demand
Show 7 more facts
- publication date
- 1998-03-26
- film editor
- Stu Linder
- title
- Wag the Dog
- nominated for
- Academy Award for Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay
- distributed by
- Netflix
- review score
- 74/100
- after a work by
- Larry Beinhart
Sources (12)
via Wikidata · CC0
~10 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Wag the Dog is a 1997 American political satire black comedy film starring Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro. Produced and directed by Barry Levinson, the film centers on a spin doctor and a Hollywood producer who fabricate a war in Albania to distract voters from a presidential sex scandal. The screenplay by Hilary Henkin and David Mamet is loosely adapted from Larry Beinhart's 1993 novel American Hero.
Wag the Dog was released one month before the news broke of the Clinton–Lewinsky scandal and eight months before the bombing of the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan by the Clinton administration in August 1998, which prompted the media to draw comparisons between the film and reality. The comparison was also made in December 1998, when the administration initiated a bombing campaign of Iraq during Clinton's impeachment trial for the Clinton–Lewinsky scandal. It was made again in spring 1999, when the administration intervened in the Kosovo War and initiated a bombing campaign against Yugoslavia, which, coincidentally, bordered Albania and contained ethnic Albanians.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Wag the Dog” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.