Philip Morris Using PR To Look Like A Good Actor In The Movies

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The Philip Morris (PM) tobacco company has announced a brand new advertising campaign aimed at begging the movie industry not to use Marlboro cigarettes in movies. The campaign is a public relations move designed to blunt the effects of growing bodies of research showing that there is more smoking in the movies now than ever before, and that smoking in the movies increases adolescent smoking. The campaign is also designed to dampen the effects of internal tobacco industry documents showing exactly how hard the industry has worked over the decades to get smoking into the movies to take advantage of its extensive, under-the-radar advertising value. Critics of the ads argue that if PM was really serious about eliminating its products from the movies, it would sue moviemakers who feature PM products. After all, history shows that when PM is really serious about stopping something, it sues, like it did with the ABC Television network over a 1994 "Day One" segment discussing spiking cigarettes with nicotine.