A couple weeks ago I walked into the Times Square Toys R Us to buy a ‘Magic 8-Ball’ for the guy at the insurance company who saved my bacterial infected eyeballs from blindness. I wasn’t in there five minutes but who should I literally bump into but Geoffrey the Giraffe, Toys R Us’ mascot. He was at least seven-feet tall, with a stitched in smile and a red and white striped jacket like the ones worn by stereotypical barbershop quartets. He was surrounded by a cadre of screaming children and when I bumped into him he put his hands on my shoulders to make sure I didn’t lose my balance. Without thinking, I thanked him; in response, he waved. In response to his wave, I smiled like a little girl. And meant it. Did I mention I’ll be 36 years old in September? (Don’t worry: you have plenty of time to shop.)
So I’m saying I’m not the most difficult person to please, which is why it’s surprising to report that ‘Thank You for Smoking’ was a huge disappointment. This is a movie that has everything going for it: an exceptional trailer (more important than I care to admit: there should be an Oscar ® category for these things); an outrageous premise (being the adventures of a likable Tobacco lobbyists spinning his product while trying to act as a role model to his son); an exceptional and smartly utilized cast (Aaron Eckhart, William H. Macy, Maria Bello, David Koechner, Robert Duvall, Sam Elliot, Rob Lowe, Josh Brody and, one of my favorite character actors ever, J.K. Simmons) an intelligent script (written by Jason Reitman; based on the novel by Christopher Buckley); and a Production design that makes you wish the movie would never end even though the film should come with the warning label ‘Exposure to this film may make the viewer incredibly cranky’.
Why was I cranky? Because the film, smart as it may be, is condescending as hell. The film begins with a montage narrated by Nick Naylor, the Tobacco Lobbyist at the heart of the film, filled with quotes and images showing us who he is and what he’s all about. (“You know the guy who can pick up any girl?” He says. “I'm him on crack”; or “Michael Jordan plays ball. Charlie Manson kills people. I talk.”) Eckhart delivers these lines with an unbeatable combination of charm and smarm that is difficult to dismiss. The montage is great in the way it builds our expectation of who he is and what he does and I could not wait to see him in action.
The montage ends with the film’s first scene: Naylor is taking part as a panelist on a talk show. He is being called on to defend Big Tobacco against panelists from ‘Mother’s Against Teen Smoking’ and a rather timid fellow representing a Wisconsin Senator who is waging a campaign to place a skull and crossbones on packs of cigarettes. There is even a child named ‘Cancer Boy’ who is dying from lung cancer. The audience boos Nick Naylor and given our familiarity with corporate spin-doctors, we can see their point. But then Naylor politely raises his hand to speak. From the montage, I was expecting great things from Nick Naylor. He smiles his smarmy smile and acknowledges both the tragedy of Cancer Boy’s situation and the audience’s hostility toward Big Tobacco. “How on earth would Big Tobacco profit off of the loss of this young man?” He says, referring to Cancer Boy. “Isn’t it in Big Tobacco’s best interest to keep [him] alive and smoking?”
It’s a great line: It’s smart, offensive, audacious, somewhat true and a great opening salvo to a much larger conversation, which I hoped would slowly bring the talk show audience and to his side and illuminate the larger issues at hand. (i.e. what major problems ever get solved via talk show? How did we and why should we take debates on talk-shows seriously? What do we talk about when we talk about cigarettes?) Imagine my horror then when the audience completely capitulates with that one line and begins to applaud. I was shocked and extremely disappointed. The bubble had burst; the Naylor in this scene didn’t match up to the Naylor of the montage. What’s more, the film proceeded as if its point had been made – that this man could sell ice to the Eskimos – and it was difficult to take it seriously after that.
I tried; I really did: I forgave, tried to forget, rationalized, blamed my own ignorance and lack of knowledge, whispered jokes to Jeremy in an attempt to lighten up but nothing worked. The film had built itself on a faulty premise and no matter how hard it tried, the Nick Naylor it presented did not live up to the one they promised and the resulting film seemed too clever and self-satisfied.
Let’s take the quote “Michael Jordan plays ball. Charlie Manson kills people. I talk.” The quote seems to put Nick Naylor and his acumen on par with the legacy of those two people. But Michael Jordan did not merely played basketball. His skill and finesse combined with his business acumen globalized the sport, changed the way basketball was played and marketed and exposed the world to stylish and overpriced basketball shoes from which it will never recover. And Charles Manson did not merely kill people: he was a charismatic leader whose exploits exposed the seedy underbelly of the hippie movement and took its message of peace and love to a disturbing extreme. Nick Naylor does talk but his talk does nothing to seriously galvanize a movement or make people rethink the way they (or we) approach Big Tobacco, smokers, talk shows, Hollywood executives, mothers, fathers, children, families, integrity, dignity or respect that I couldn’t have learned from watching an episode of Entertainment Tonight ®. It seemed like a movie that reaffirmed everything we already knew about these things and was made to make us feel good about knowing. The movie promised complexity and gave us Joan Lunden. Bad filmmakers! Naughty filmmakers! Shame on you! Shame!
That said, a couple things need to be mentioned:
1) Aaron Eckhart’s performance in ‘Thank You for Smoking’ is a breakthrough from past roles. He plays Nick Naylor, the tobacco lobbyist at the center of the film, with a sense of humor and self-assurance of which I thought him totally incapable. (I love when this happens, by the way. I will now have to totally rethink his career, which means I’ll probably Net-Flix every single one of his films. Every film but ‘Possession’. Please don’t make me watch that film again. Please.) His Nick Naylor oozes charm and self-deprecation, an unbeatable combination that makes him impossibly charming yet totally approachable, He also has a great set of teeth (They are incredibly white and mostly straight, like the United States Senate and the cast of ‘One Tree Hill’). And his hair…can we talk about his hair? Blonde and floppy, exquisitely cut, with chocolaty brown highlights. It is the kind of hair you love to look at and dream of running your fingers through. Did I mention Naylor’s skin? Don’t even get me started on his skin…
2) Would somebody PLEASE solve the Katie Holmes problem? I swear on both my grandmothers’ graves that there is an actor in that Tom Cruise hostage. For proof of this, rent ‘Pieces of April’; or get a hold of the final episode of the first season of ‘Dawson’s Creek’; or the episode in season four or five where she is mugged at an ATM. If there are any producers or agents or directors reading this (and I know that’s a HUGE possibility), please stop thinking of her as a dude magnet. Her character’s sex scenes in ‘Thank You For Smoking’ were painful to watch. When this actress is given something to do she’s the rare actress or actor capable of emotional complexity. I swear. Just give her a chance. Please.
3) Rob Lowe is awesome in this movie. Simply awesome. Building upon his character work in ‘Wayne’s World’ and the ‘Austin Power’ films, (and by character work I mean Rob Lowe being Rob Lowe), his Asian-influenced, Hollywood exec is a thing of comic beauty: the scene of him wearing a Kimono and telling Naylor he only sleeps on Sundays is worth the price of admission.
