Wag the Dog

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.