01
Can you imagine a profession in the world that specializes in persuading others to smoke? Can you imagine that the smoking scenes in the movie are advertisements that tobacco companies have spent a lot of money on? Can you imagine that in the face of a teenager with cancer, the head of the health and human services agency would have preferred his death because they would have received more attention and budget, and the last thing they wanted the boy to die was the tobacco company, because it would hurt them.
The absurdity is permeated with the truth of the bone, the interests are supreme, and they are all legitimate. Morally condemned? If it is easy to do, then set up a foundation to persuade teenagers not to smoke.
That's what we did in the movie "Thank You for Smoking."
The protagonist, Nile, is the chief spokesman of the tobacco company, who is clever, eloquent, and loyal to the interests of the tobacco company.
On television, when the heads of the Anti-Adolescent Smoking Mothers Association, the Lung Association, and the Health and Human Services tried to blame smoking on a boy's cancer, Nile countered that the tobacco companies were really concerned about the fate of boys, and they just wanted to get more budgets, and that the tobacco companies were planning to set up a $50 million fund to end teen smoking.
02
But hard stubble followed, and Senator Altland was trying to pass a bill to print a skull on a cigarette case as a reminder that "smoking is harmful to health."
In response, Nile proposed that he could go to Hollywood, shoot a smoking scene, and put it in a big movie to make people think that smoking is also a cool thing. The boss appreciated the offer, and Neel immediately left for Hollywood. Eventually, the lens was bought for $25 million. Tough capital is really pervasive, and perhaps the advertisement that you have to brush your teeth twice a day on TV is a joint manipulation from toothpaste manufacturers and toothbrush manufacturers. You will find that "interests" are like black clothes, it is a wild one, it can be combined with politics, it can cooperate with science, it can coexist with medicine, it can be linked to health, it can be omnipotent, it is omnipotent, it is not distinguished between praise and criticism, only look at the pros and cons, and anything seems to be reduced to six words: people are stupid, money is more, come quickly. The wolf loves the sheep, loves the flesh, and the man loves the sheep, inside and out.
After settling the film scenes, Neel is given a new task, he has to take the "pension" to find a "victim", Lonnie. Lonnie was once the face of a cigarette brand, but now he's a lung patient who is active in front of the television camera, complaining about the harm that smoking brings to him.
It wasn't a good job, but Neel was confident. Who would refuse an apologetic and generous "sealing fee"?
When Lonnie accuses him of abandoning him in order to save money on advertising, Nile is already confident because he understands that what Lonnie hates is not cigarettes, but the indifference of tobacco companies. He poured a box of money on a blanket, and the impact was definitely better than putting it in the box. The end result speaks for itself.
03
Will someone like Nile be a close friend besides the tobacco company? It is the kind of friend who has no interest in it.
There really is. Neeller had two close friends, one was the spokesperson for the alcohol industry and the other was the spokesperson for the arms business, and they called themselves the mod trio, the Death Merchants Group. They meet once a week to compare the number of deaths caused by their respective industries and to complain about the righteous people in their lives. It is so "heartless and lungless", but it is extremely frank. You will find that people hate truth more than truth. The MOD trio said that they had no heart and no lungs, but they did not do anything bad, after all, they did not instigate others to smoke and drink, and the choice was in people's own hands. They are real people at best, so real that they don't care about lying, they are professional liars.
Neel put the tobacco companies in trouble and went on television to debate with senators, which was a hit. First, he was kidnapped by anti-smoking extremists and injected a large amount of nicotine into his body, and almost died. Later, he was betrayed by a female journalist who had an ambiguous relationship with him, and all the things he had done before were published in the newspaper, resulting in his dismissal.
04
How does someone like Nile educate his children? What would his child do if he smoked? What about their paternity?
Well, Neel's son didn't smoke because Neel told his children that "it's right to listen to their mothers" and that smoking is not allowed before the age of eighteen. What about after the age of eighteen? Neel's answer was that if that was the child wanted to smoke, he would buy him the first pack.
In addition, the most that Neel gave to his son was independent thinking. "As long as you debate it right, you can't be wrong." Nile calls it "the beauty of debate," which is really about learning to think and to challenge authority. So, when Nile wants to take his son to California with him but is rejected by his ex-wife, the son begins to question his mother and successfully convinces his mother.
In California, For the first time, Neel's son got a close-up look at his father's way of working, and Neel's work required a great deal of moral flexibility that would otherwise not have been possible. Just like you're a lawyer, you now need to defend a murderer. Will you defend? If you defend yourself, morality will condemn you and think you are wrong. But you don't need to prove you're right, you just have to tell people that the law requires everyone to be fairly defended, so it's not you who's wrong, it's them who're wrong. This is moral flexibility. That's what Neele plays, so he doesn't need to prove that "smoking is harmful to health" is wrong, which science has proven, he's just putting on the cloak of interest for science and then letting people choose freely, which is not noble, but it's not evil either.
05
In the movie, Senator Altland, who runs for a ban on smoking, may be a "positive character", but he is also very dishonest. On one side, he tried to smoke smoking, but on the other hand, his desk was full of wine. So, to say it's for the sake of children's health is just a kind of show in front of the stage. For the sake of votes, for the sake of one's own political future, this is true, but can it be said that it is Otelland's fault? Nor can it be said, it can only be said to be hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is a way of life and a principle of survival, not a mistake. At the hearing, Nile publicly punctured the show. Cholesterol kills far more people than cigarettes, and the big cheese business comes from the state where the Congressman of Ortland is. Such a comparison seems to be able to find the similar side of Neelor and Otterland, regardless of political identity, both are spokesmen for the interests of different industries, so the contest between the two is, in the final analysis, a struggle between interests. Only by facing the interests head-on can we restore the noble, and can we appreciate how morality flexibly moves in front of and behind the scenes.
06
"Thank You For Smoking" is a good movie that makes people think. Everyone has their own set of logical thinking and terminology, which are intertwined with each other and exchange benefits. Almost everyone knows that "smoking is harmful to health", but a considerable number of people will still choose to smoke because someone interferes with your choice. In life, we really need to think and discern, and don't look for freedom in the traps dug by others. The right thing to do should come from your decisiveness and responsibility, being true to your responsibilities, and then telling yourself that if something is wrong from the beginning, then don't start him.
At the end of the film, Nile abandons the invitation of his boss to be the spokesperson for the tobacco company, and at that moment, he looks at his children, I think, which means his responsibility and a new understanding of responsibility.