Warner Brothers' 2009 box office hit, PG-13 rated "He's Just Not That Into You"
According to a February 25 New York Times article, The American Medical Association is planning on lodging an official complaint against Warner Brothers for its “disturbing images of specific cigarette brands” in their new movie, “He’s Just Not That Into You.” Melissa Walthers, director of the health advocacy group’s effort to reduce teenage smoking, says that there is no artistic reason to include such images.
While the movie “He’s Just Not That Into You” doesn’t show anyone smoking, there are numerous shots of the cigarette brand Natural American Spirit Lights in their recognizable bright yellow box as well as a red Marlboro carton, and the AMA is not happy. Ironically, the story line places smoking in a negative light. The main character, played by Jennifer Connelly, leaves her husband not because he cheated on her (although he did) but because he lied about quitting smoking.
Ms. Walthers says that various studies estimate that smoking in films prompts 200,000 young people to start smoking each year. Other health organizations besides the AMA have pressured The Motion Picture Association of America to “trim tobacco sequences” from their movies, but the industry cites the need for artistic license and, in 2007, refused to consider an outright ban on cigarettes and smoking in film.
As for anyone out there skeptical about the power of the media to influence consumers, look back to the year 1934 and the release of the Frank Capra comedy, “It Happened One Night” with Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, the winner of five Academy Awards, including Best Picture (Columbia). Sales of men’s undershirts declined sharply after Gable, undressing for bed in a scene, took off his shirt and appeared bare-chested and sexy. He was not wearing the traditional undershirt, a standard clothing item at the time for men. According to legend, sales of undershirts plummeted overnight. American men had made up their minds. If Clark Gable didn’t think he needed an undershirt under his shirt, then neither did they.
Click here to see the famous scene from “It Happened One Night” titled, “The Walls of Jericho.” (That’s Claudette Colbert with Gable, who, win finishing the movie, pronounced it the worst she’d ever made – then went on to win an Oscar for that very movie.
Lisa's History Room 
I think that when actors were a part of the studio machine and movies were such a huge part of American entertainment, there was more influence. Would one actor wield such power today? I don’t know. Undershirts are kind of dorky anyway. LOL.
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Hi! Aren’t undershirts the in-thing now if they are worn alone? My twenty-year-old daughter wears them with scarves around her neck ala Nicole Richie. They call the undershirts “wife-beaters”! So maybe they’re dorky except when they’re worn on the outside! Go figure.
I think you’re right about no actors today having as much impact as Gable did in 1934. There are so many influences now. The music influence is huge. Back in 1934, there was no TV so the movies (and mags) were the main visual influences. Now we are bombarded with them. Has Brad Pitt made his newsboy hat popular? My husband thinks he has popularized the hat as has Britney Spears.
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Clark Gable is the direct descendant of the American Revolution.
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Hi, V.E.G., through what lineage?
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Lisa, here is Clark Gable’s lineage:
George Frederick STAINBROOK (American Revolutionary War Patriot)
Johan Jacob STAINBROOK
Jacob Stainbrook
Nancy Ann Stainbrook
William Henry Gable
William Clark Gable
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I apologize for getting back with you so late; my blog has been down and I have been unable to reply to comments until today. Thank you for this neat lineage.
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“Ms. Walthers says that various studies estimate that smoking in films prompts 200,000 young people to start smoking each year.”
Ms. Walthers doesn’t know the numbers cited to be accurate, and claiming that ‘various studies estimate’ is about as bad as claiming you were given the figure by the man in the moon. Certainly smoking is bad, but the greater crime, it seems to me, is the ongoing intrusion into our everyday lives and the sense of entitlement held by people in government bureaucracies and their supporters to impinge upon the freedom of others.
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I gather that you are a smoker.
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[…] in cuff-links. In the summer he can wear a short-sleeve dress shirt. As for undershirts, forget Clark Gable; all the big-shots wear wife-beaters under their shirts.4. Tailored dress coats fall under a […]
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