Q What do you think of the smoking ban?
Since we are on the subject of anti-smoking, I would like to say what I have been longing to say for years: when are we going to ban insidious smoking advertising in movies?
I went to see Babel and in typical current fashion there was a scene where the actress was calmed in her wounded derangement by smoke from a long pipe in Morocco. The very subtle message is that not all tobaccos are bad and tobacco is not bad for you all the time.
And then the scene switched to Japan, where there were actually scenes of people smoking cigarettes! I bet legislation in Japan is more lax and actual smoking scenes are still allowed. This might well be the reason why Japan was dragged into the movie in the first place, since the plot could have easily used any other country.
I went to see Nana 2. There was a huge number of smoking scenes. In one scene the actress was greatly distressed and was telling this to the actor. He takes out a packet of cigarettes and offers it to her. She says: 'I thought you said you had given up smoking?' He doesn't say a thing, she hesitates and then takes one, lights up and is visibly relaxed.
If that is not insidious smoking advertising, I don't know what is. In fact, it is not that insidious because it was telling people not to quit smoking. I predict there will be a resurgence of Japanese films (secretly funded by the tobacco industry) until Japan enacts laws to stop it. Japan may not have the guts to do so in view of its prolonged economic slump.