Our Flick of the Week is the stunning political satire “Wag the Dog,” featuring an outrageous but plausible premise: that political operatives float the rumor of a war to divert attention from a presidential scandal to help get their boss re-elected. The specifics here are preposterous, to be sure, but the writing is so funny that you can’t help but laugh your way into perversely wishing this sort of stunt were true.
It’s just a couple of weeks before Election Day, and the unseen chief executive has been accused of gross sexual misconduct. Enter a political Mr. Fix-it (Robert De Niro in a refreshingly restrained performance), who in turn hires a Hollywood producer friend (Dustin Hoffman at his comic best) who views the staging of a war as no different from the staging of a movie. Together they pick Albania as a plausible enemy and proceed to trick the media into following the story. By implication, the movie also ridicules us, the electorate, for going along with the story. A bright idea well realized by director Barry Levinson. R. (star) (star) (star) 1/2