Professional Report - Smoke Free Movies

Since in-film advertising is on the rise, tobacco companies too might use this opportunity to push in their brands
into films…
The filmmaker as well as the star involved would not like to do tobacco products. Even if as a producer I
suggested to my actor that we’re getting some money out of this and the company would like to place their
products. The actor would normally say, ‘let’s avoid cigarettes.’ Most makers themselves are conscious. Maybe
some very small films may, but then that kind of films wouldn’t be targeted by advertising companies… they
wouldn’t be interested in films where the numbers are small.
Have you been approached by any tobacco company for any of your films?
No.
Some actors have been known to endorse cigarette brands…like Jackie Shroff and Akshay Kumar…
Those bravery things…
Is there ever any pressure on actors who endorse those brands to smoke them while they are acting in films?
No. As a matter of fact, even in those ads, they don’t actually show them smoking. They trying to brand it in a
different way, by making the name popular and associating it with heroism…surrogate advertising.
Do you feel then that Hindi films don’t glamorise the act of smoking.
No they don’t.
Would smoking be scripted into the film at the stage of writing the scene or would it happen on the sets?
As far as I can remember, I never really encouraged it at all. At a time when the awareness was not high. What
naturally happens, is that because one has seen those kind of scenes, when you have a sequence where a
character is worried, pacing up and down, wife is going to deliver a baby, and you don’t know how to show that
nervousness, you can use that as a moment to show smoking…an actor needs props all the time. But as I
said, today it’s no longer used.
Would you say that because the kind of films being made, smoking doesn’t have a place in them?
Ok, for the last ten years there has been a round of good-feel films, family films, so there wasn’t any reason to
show smoking. But if one wasn’t aware about this thing, I think it would have been quite easy to put it into films.
Playing with a cigarette, as they used to…blowing smoke into somebody’s face…all that has stopped. It used
to happen at one time.
Are you a smoker?
No. I am one of the lucky few I guess. My father didn’t smoke or mother. A couple of my brothers smoked.
Would you be open to the idea, as a filmmaker, of putting anti-smoking messages in films?
I wouldn’t mind that at all if it came about in a way that it is not a lecture, as something deviating…From
somewhere within the film.
Thank you.
Rajiv Rai
What is your perception about the influence of cinema on youth behaviour?
There is a lot of talk about influence of cinema. It goes like this, a lot of children, teenagers, college going
people, are at a certain age when they don’t have a family or married or settled down with serious work and are
young and have time at hand, will hero worship. They put up posters of singers and actors. They need to follow
somebody. But if you look at all the posters that people put up…for example, Hrithik, when his film was a hit, or
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