Ssssssmokin' in Hollywood films

70 years ago, American's couldn't watch a Hollywood film without seeing their favorite actors smoke on screen. During the silent film era, directors would have their actors smoke on screen so that they would have something to do with their hands.

Back then, smoking was used in films as a sign of lavishness, and high society. Only the rich and extravagant would be seen smoking, and were also played by the biggest stars in Hollywood.


Nowadays however, the people who smoke in Hollywood movies usually have some underlying problem, or come from very low society communities. Those who smoke tend to be in bad physical health, which doesn't seem to bother them.



Above is a picture of Mae West, a very famous actress in Hollywood during the 1930's dressed very extravagantly, and smoking a cigarette as expected by high society. This appears to be a favorable image of a role model during that time, suggesting this behavior was imitated.


On the other hand, look at the picture below:


This is Helena Bonham Carter as Marla Singer in the movie Fight Club. As you can see, she is dressed very sleazy, appears to be in bad health, and seemingly doesn't care abut her appearence.


Take Will Smith for example. He's a big star in Hollywood today. Had he been a star back in the 1930's, he would be on screen smoking in every film he was in. However, I ran a search on google to find a picture of him smoking in a film, and found no results. In fact, there weren't any pictures of him smoking at all, in any context.




This suggests that the stars of Hollywood today are urged to not smoke, at least while they are in the public spotlight, so that their behavior will not be emulated. It's clear to see that smoking is now portrayed in a negative light and celebrities don't want to be associated with that. Therefore, if you want to be more like your favorite stars of today, don't smoke.



http://img5.allocine.fr/acmedia/medias/nmedia/18/64/88/83/18816592.jpg

http://i26.tinypic.com/2zo9nph.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/ii50/lingeriecompany/maewest_cig.jpg

http://images.askmen.com/galleries/men/will-smith/pictures/will-smith-picture-1.jpg

http://www.tobaccofree.org/films.htm



Posted by: Ryan
Classical Conditioning (Message #2)