Smoke Free Movies has launched a series of print advertisements in Variety and other publications. This advertisement first ran on February 20, 2009.

Congratulations! 23 films nominated for Academy Awards include tobacco.

Big Tobacco should practice its thank-you speech. This year, every live-action feature nominated in every Academy Award category* paraded tobacco imagery across the screen.

Including fourteen nominated features rated “R” by the Motion Picture Association of America. And nine more features rated PG-13 (although only two of them disclose smoking in their MPAA rating label).

Coincidence? Of course not.

Smoking is almost impossible to avoid in a year when almost 80 percent of R-rated films and more than half of PG-13 movies featured tobacco.

Eleven films this year even showcased tobacco brands. Eight of them cast Marlboro, the leading brand among adolescent smokers.

The real tragedy is that young audiences can be protected using the film industry’s own R-rating. And so few industry leaders are aware that progress is already occurring, at no cost.

Can you recall the smoking in even five of these nominated movies? If it’s so marginal to the film, who was it important to?

And why?

* Analysis included every live-action category except Foreign Language and Short Films, for which we had incomplete information.

[Ashtray with caption]

Introducing the Roscoe®, an elegantly restrained but practical ashtray award to put next to your flashy statuette. This year, we ordered crates.

[Sidebar]

You’ve seen the movies, now get the big picture.

A new report issued Feb. 18 by Breathe California and UCSF spotlights on-screen smoking trends from 1991 to 2008. The deeper inside the industry you are, the more it will interest you. Download your copy now: http://repositories.cdlib.org/ctcre/tcpmus/Movies2008.

Smoke Free Movies

SmokeFreeMovies.ucsf.edu

Smoking in movies kills in real life. | Smoke Free Movie policies—the R-rating, certification of no payoffs, anti-tobacco spots, and an end to brand display—are endorsed by the World Health Organization, American Medical Association, AMA Alliance, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Heart Association, American Legacy Foundation, American Lung Association, American Public Health Association, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, L.A. County Dept. of Health Services, New York State Dept. of Health, N.Y. State PTA, and many others. Visit our web site or write: Smoke Free Movies, UCSF School of Medicine, San Francisco, CA 94143-1390.