So why have we gone from an age where everyone smokes in movies (see Ms. Deville above, note what's in her right hand), to a time when lighting up gets a movie slapped with a higher rating?
Read on...
I'm certainly not arguing for smoking in movies, but it's ridiculous to not have some people smoke in movies. Of course what we see influences what we do to some extent, but just because one person smokes a cigarette in an action movie doesn't mean that the entire audience will suddenly rush out of the theater for a nicotine fix.
It seems to me, right away, that there are two ways to deal with the issue at hand:
1) Ban/criminalize tobacco and all tobacco products in real life.
2) Disband (or at the very least loosen the strength and pull of) the MPAA and let filmmakers and studios decide for themselves what's suitable for their films and what isn't, and let parents, lawmakers, and teachers deal with the issue of the youth using tobacco.
It seems perfectly clear that the former option will never happen, so the latter must be the way, right?
Well, maybe not.
Censorship in Hollywood has come a long way since Will Hays, former Postmaster General of the United States, was called to Hollywood by the 5 major studios of the time and put in charge of the recently formed MPAA, instituting the strict so-called "Hays Code," but not enough. While the Hays Code, which strictly oversaw and censored the content of films produced in the Hollywood system from 1930 until it was canned in 1968 when studios began releasing films without submitting them to the MPAA first; I think it's time for them to start doing that again.
Jack Kirby's 2006 "This Film is Not Yet Rated" (also discussed in the NYT piece previously mentioned) offers an interesting (and comedic) take on the MPAA. His film reveals some interesting facts that many don't realize about this organization that tells audiences what they can and cannot see at movie theaters, such as the fact that the raters are all anonymous, that ratings are decided by a startlingly small group of people, that all of these people are completely inexperienced and have no ties to the film industry, and all are rather conservative middle-aged people with children.
In the film, Kirby sets out to discover who these raters are, but somewhere along the way the movie takes an odd turn and loses sight of it's point. It's worth a watch, though, if you're interested in this topic, which I assume most current film-goers are. The moral of the film, basically, is that the MPAA is evil.
Hollywood can't release movies without ratings because, under the current system, no one will see them. People rely on the ratings to the extent that NC-17 is a death sentence (as is an unrated movie), and the difference between R and PG-13 can be the difference between a profitable film and one that doesn't recoup it's budget.
I don't think that everyone in all movies should smoke for the film's entire running length, but I think that having no one smoke in any movie is like having no one cursing on a cop show: it just isn't realistic.
If art is the ultimate aim there can't be any restrictions, and that includes bad habits. Film has always been the reinvention of real life on screen, but what would it be without a cigarette every now and then (you know, unless they criminalize tobacco... please?)? Cinéma vérité? Certainly not.
-Mitchell Geller
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