What kind of impact do movies have on us? Films can make us laugh, and make us cry, but do they also influence us to engage in the same kind of behavior as our onscreen heroes? We’ve heard arguments for and against the cause-and-effect relationship of onscreen sex and violence, but what about onscreen smoking? The first recorded opposition to cigarettes was in 1892. Cigarettes were labeled by the Senate Committee on Epidemic Diseases to be an “an evil” and a “public health hazard” and urged petitioners to “seek remedies from states”.
Yet, with the US entering into World War I, commanders and generals ere more concerned with “sobriety and chastity” than tobacco and actually encouraged its use. A civilian campaign called “Smokes for Soldiers” started in 1917, and distributed thousands of cigarettes during the short time the US was involved with the war. Newspapers throughout the country displayed headlines and advertisements such as “Our Army in France is Short of Tobacco,” “Boys at Front Need Tobacco,” and “I Need Smokes More Than Anything Else”. While most of the country fully supported this cause, there were still critics.
John Harvey Kellogg wrote, “The cigarette is known to be an enemy of scholarship, of culture, of orals, of health and vigor, and yet it is tolerated, even encouraged. The millions of cigarettes now being fired at our soldiers will… hit its mark and do its mischief. More American soldiers will be damaged by the cigarette than by German bullets”. In the thirties and forties smoking was supported and promoted by celebrities such as Greta Garbo, Rudolph Valentino, Gary Cooper, Fred Astaire, Humphrey Bogart, even J. Edgar Hoover, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Eleanor Roosevelt, all of whom smoked cigarettes quite often.
It was in the thirties that the heroes were far more likely to smoke cigarettes than illains. It was in 1961 that the major public health organizations such as the American Cancer Society, the American Public Health Association, the American Heart Association, and the National Tuberculosis Association sent a letter to President Kennedy asking him to put together a team to study the effects of smoking. Kennedy agreed and in 1962 the Surgeon General’s Advisory Committee on Smoking and Health was formed with the mission to study the effects of smoking on health.
This delighted the public health organizations and other anti-tobacco activists. It consisted of 10 members. Eight of them had their MD degree (three of which also held a PhD), a PhD chemist, and a statistician. Three smoked cigarettes and two smoked cigars. No person who had taken a public stand on the issue was even considered for the board. After about a year of work, on January 11, 1964, the Advisory Board proclaimed that cigarette smoke was a major health risk and perhaps the cause of rising cancer rates. The Surgeon General at the time (Luther Terry) remembers, “The report hit the country like a bombshell”.
Over the next three months, the use of cigarettes dropped ignificantly (almost twenty percent). While it did eventually rise again to the prior consumption rate, this report left a major imprint that could not be overlooked. This was the start of a new movement in the US. Soon after, the government issued the Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act of 1965, which required cigarette manufacturers to place a warning label on cigarettes stating “Warning: The Surgeon General has found that smoking is hazardous to your health”.
Then in 1969, the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act had the Surgeon General’s health warning changed to “Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that cigarette smoking is dangerous to your health”. In 1970 the tobacco industry attempted to challenge the act, but failed. Also in 1970, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was created to “prevent and control water and air pollution caused by unnatural forces”. For the first time (in 1973) non-smoking sections were offered to airline passengers. It wasn’t until 1990 that smoking was completely banned on all domestic flights less than six hours.
In 1984, the Comprehensive Smoking Education Act was enacted, which started a rotation of four health warnings on all cigarette packages. In 1987, the United States Department of Health and Human Services began prohibiting smoking in its offices. By 1993, the American Cancer Society (ACS) had prepared its “Action Plan”, which included raising cigarette taxes, the banning of tobacco advertising, workplace smoking bans, and more. California took an even greater step and banned smoking in all indoor businesses and indoor restaurants in 1995.
It was a bold move that was cheered by anti-smoking activists and booed by smoking supporters. Now the question many people are asking is, whether or not movies bear any responsibility in popularizing smoking. Some health advocates are concerned that the portrayal of smoking in the movies contributes to the idea that cigarettes are glamorous, sexy, and cool, etc. and may lure some children to try smoking. Research findings suggest that by limiting access to R-rated movies (which typically depict alcohol and cigarette use in a positive light), parents can reduce the chance that their children try cigarettes or alcohol.
Would using the movie ratings system help limit children’s exposure to on-screen smoking? Although research strongly suggests the possibility, not everyone accepts the claim that movies play n important role in influencing children’s smoking behaviors. The evidence supporting the claim is limited to only a few observational studies, all of which face the challenge of segregating the effect of movies from adolescent personalities and parenting characteristics. Some may feel that movies are simply the wrong battleground for the fight against tobacco.
An online magazine called FOREST (Freedom Organization for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco) has defended the interests of smokers for more that 24 years. According to them, they “neither promote smoking nor do we deny the health risks of smoking. Instead, we defend the interests of adults who choose to smoke; we promote freedom of choice for employers and proprietors who wish to accommodate smokers on their premises; and we speak out against those who want to discriminate against smokers or ban smoking completely.
Last but not least, we promote greater courtesy and tolerance between smokers and non-smokers. ” RESPONDING to a report in The Lancet suggesting that smoking in films promote smoking among adolescents, director of FOREST, Simon Clark says “We welcome the report but it doesn’t alter the fact that the main reason hildren start smoking is because of peer pressure, not because they see someone smoking in movies. ” According to the Lancet study, 90% of the students who witnessed smoking in movies did not start smoking during the follow-up period.
Clark also argues to the point that many children grow up with parents who smoke, choose not to smoke themselves. “People, even children, are incredibly complex. There is no single reason why anyone behaves in a certain way so it would be a gross over- reaction to ban smoking in films and it could make matters worse because it might encourage teenagers to become even more rebellious. No one wants children to smoke but you can’t shield teenagers from the facts of life and the truth is that, in Europe and America, almost a third of the adult population smoke.
Filmmakers simply reflect that and it would be wrong to force them to depict a Utopian world that doesn’t exist. ” Michael Perley of the Ontario Campaign for Action On Tobacco doesn’t believe that seeing a star smoke in a film is going to make a non-smoker to leave a theater and go buy a pack, but he has real concerns: “I worry about the cumulative effect of having Hollywood reinforce the appearance of normalcy or even glamour of smoking. There has been a swing back to a positive portrayal of smoking that we haven’t seen since the ’50s. And it’s happening in films that appeal to teen audiences. The American Lung Association agrees. According to its studies, the movies of 1997-1998 were the most smoke-filled of that decade. To make matters worse, there was also a huge increase in the amount of tobacco use in PG-rated movies. Perley sites an example, “Take a film like Titanic which was such a huge hit with teenagers. Kate Winslett’s character [Rose] smokes. To make it worse, her smoking is seen as a badge of liberation against a boring and epressive world. So the smoking is seen as a good thing.
We’re supposed to cheer her for being so daring. Another teen film that has been subject to criticism is “There’s Something About Mary”. In fact, just before the Oscars last year, the film was given the infamous ‘Hackademy’ award by a panel of 200 teenage judges who objected to the film’s cigarette usage during a love scene. They reviewed the top 50 movies of each year from 1991 through 1998. They found that 82 per cent of the 350 films had some reference to or depiction of smoking, but only 28 percent felt the reference was negative. Perley is not surprised. “Hollywood is doing young people a gross disservice.
Winona Ryder is a notorious smoker. She smokes in practically every movie and it’s not a negative portrayal. There’s no discussion of the fact that smoking is addictive or the fact that tobacco products have no safe level of use or that it can kill you. What’s happening in the ’90s is part of a very sophisticated effort by the U. S. tobacco industry to get back acceptance,” he adds. “The tobacco industry is under siege, but also desperate to keep market share. They are utterly dependent on the youth market. ” Does this mean the tobacco industry is planting the pro-smoking messages? We don’t know what’s happening in Canadian films,” says Perley, “but there is plenty of evidence that cigarette companies have paid for positive product placement in the U. S. ” Health and consumer protection commissioner David Byrne claimed that tobacco companies have found a way around the bans on advertising through “product placement” in films and fashion shoots in magazines.
According to Byrne, Sylvester Stallone wrote a letter to his agent explaining that he would exclusively smoke Brown and Williamson tobacco roducts (Lucky Strike, Kool, Pall Mall, Viceroy) in no less than five feature films in exchange for a $500,000 fee. Movie characters smoking onscreen often look cool and glamorous doing it,” he said. “To those who are the targets, I say, don’t be fooled by the tobacco industry. See through the plot. ” Perley admits to being frustrated. “The most current view on tobacco control is that there has to be a comprehensive approach. You have to create smoke-free environments, raise the price of tobacco products, stop tobacco sponsorship of events and educate the public about the harmful ffects; but there is always going to be a crack in the dike if we do all these things and still have positively reinforced images in movies and television”.
The anti-smoking-in movies group ‘Smoke Screeners’ recommends four things that should be required of movies that portray smoking. They believe that movie theaters should be required to run anti-smoking ads (not produced by tobacco companies) before any movie that contains smoking. They believe that tobacco brand names should never be mentioned in movies and they want all movies containing tobacco to receive an MPAA rating of “R. ”
Finally, they would like to see all movies containing tobacco to “certify no-payoffs”, or, to declare that no goods or services were traded by anyone involved with the film in exchange for the placement of tobacco in the movie. Studios such as Turner Entertainment Group, FOX, and Castle Rock have already established tobacco policies, but many others refuse to change. These groups claim that smoking is the actor’s choice, to use if it is necessary to build his/her character. In general, they view smoking as a creative freedom issue.
Since the wave of lawsuits brought against tobacco companies for egligence, endangerment, bad business practices, etc, tobacco companies have been in an uncomfortable position. They manufacture a highly addictive and damaging drug that is legal, in a country that will not allow them advertise. Is this censorship? If this trend continues, how else can tobacco companies advertise except by placing cigarettes in movies? What choices are we leaving the tobacco companies and smokers? Should they even have choices, when it is a matter of public health? Would smoking restrictions simply hinder artistic freedom? Where should we draw the line?