Youth Group Wants Council to Adopt 'Smoke-Free Hollywood' Campaign

The Youth Leadership Institute has a message for Hollywood: Stop making movies with smoking scenes in them that cater to young people.

The advocacy group believes San Bruno residents feel the same way, according to research the group presented to the City Council last week at its meeting.

Young people in the group recently completed a survey of smoking and movies—along with the help of Stanton Glantz, director of UCSF's Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education and head of the Smoke Free Movies initiative—and found that 90 percent of smokers start before they turn 18. They also found that there are more images of smoking depicted in G-rated films than in R-rated films. Additionally, they concluded that movie production companies are using taxpayer dollars to put tobacco products in their films.

"What we've seen with legislation is that we've been able to remove ads in TV, sports and magazines," said Katrina Socco, senior director programs for San Mateo County, who works with the Youth Leadership Institute. "But we're finding out that, through Hollywood, tobacco companies are paying actors and producers to place these subliminal messages in movies. And young people don't like to be tricked. Consumers don't like to be tricked either."

Socco pointed to the scenes in Avatar where Sigourney Weaver's character was smoking in a laboratory, although director James Cameron said those scenes were used to reflect reality and that neither he nor the movie condoned young people smoking, according to a New York Times interview.

In all, the youth group surveyed 125 people in San Bruno and found that 87 percent of the people opposed taxpayer money going toward movie production companies that want to put smoking in their films. More than two-thirds of those surveyed said they also wouldn't support G-rated, PG-rated or PG-13-rated movies that mention tobacco.

The group is trying to get the council to adopt a resolution supporting their smoke-free Hollywood campaign, especially because the city is home to a large movie theater complex at . The councils in Redwood City, Daly City, Pacifica and Belmont have already done so. The county Board of Supervisors and Assemblyman Jerry Hill have also endorsed the campaign.