1
Substantiation for Smokefree Movies Ad #117 (Final | Dec 2016)
[SKYHEAD]
Smoking in movies
[HEADLINE]
Hollywood’s lost decade, measured in children
[Subhead]
Tobacco policies adopted by the major studios between 2007 and 2013 allowed smoking in 42% of their top-grossing PG-13 films and exposedmoviegoers to 47 billion tobacco impressions. The MPAA must replacefailed policies with an R-rating standard that truly protects children.
SOURCES:
Tobacco depiction policies went into effect on specific datesand were publishedby Universal Pictures (Comcast) in 2007; The Walt Disney Company in 2008, updated 2015; 20th Century Fox (21st Century Fox) in 2012 (effective date estimated1 January 2012); Sony Pictures (Sony) in 2012; Warner Bros. (Time Warner) in 2007; and Paramount Pictures (Viacom) in 2013. They can be downloaded from the Smokefree Movies web site here.
“…42% of their top-grossing PG-13 films and exposed moviegoers to 47 billion tobacco impressions” — Calculated from data compiled for the major studios’ top-grossing PG-13 films by Thumbs Up! Thumbs Down! (TUTD), a project of Breathe California, and analyzed by UCSF Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education (UCSF CTCRE).
Film sample: All top-grossingPG-13 films released in the US by MPAA-member studios (“majors”) between the effective date of each company’s tobacco depiction policy and 18 November 2016. See table below for individual studio results and sum totals.
[TEXT]
Over the past decade, all six MPAA-member studios have adopted policies on tobacco in their youth-rated movies. These policies have failed audiences in at least three ways:
• From 2007 to 2010, major studios reduced the share of PG-13 films with smoking by less than 25%, in absolute terms. There has been no progress since 2010, despite three more studios adopting policies.
SOURCE: UCSF CTCRE analysis of TUTD data finds that, among MPAA-member film companies, the share of their top-grossing PG-13 films with smoking declined from 63.8% (30 of 47 films) in 2007 to 40.5% (17 of 42 films) in 2010: 63.8% - 40.5% = 23.3% absolute change in percentage. However, the smoking share for all MPAA-members’ PG-13 filmssince2010 — that is, from 2011 to 2016 (to 18 Nov) — was 42.2 percent.
• The number of tobacco incidents in a typical major studio PG-13 film with smoking in 2016 is nearly double what it was in 2007.
SOURCE: UCSF CTCRE analysis of TUTD data finds that the number of tobacco incidents in the average PG-13 film with smoking from an MPAA-member studio in 2016 (to 18 Nov) was 43.8 vs.22.8 in 2007.
The surge to 44 incidents per film in 2016 largely erased the decline observed from 2012 (49 incidents) to 2015 (18 incidents).
The total number of tobacco incidents in 2016 PG-13 films from MPAA-member studios was greater than a decade before: 701 (2016, to 18 Nov) vs. 684 (2007).
Total PG-13 incidents from these companiesmore than doubled between 2015 and 2016: from 332 (2015) to 701 (2016, to 18 Nov). 2016 incident total may further increase by the end of 2016.
• Over the past decade, the major studios have accounted for 84% of PG-13 tobacco impressions delivered to theater audiences.
SOURCE: UCSF CTCRE analysis of TUTD data finds that all top-grossing PG-13 films delivered 83.5 billion in-theater tobacco impressions (tobacco incidents X paid admission, per film) to domestic audiences from 2007 to 2016 (to 18 Nov).
• Tobacco impressions = Tobacco incidents per film X Paid admissions per film;
• Paid admissions = Domestic box office gross / Avg. ticket price [NATO];
• 2016 ticket price estimated on previous two years’ price changes.
PG-13 movies from MPAA-member film companies accounted for 84.1% (70.2 billion of 83.5 billion) of the total, with the balance from the so-called independents (smaller producer-distributors not vertically-integrated into larger media conglomerates).
Statistics on the film industry’s tobacco performance through 2015 are available in Polansky JR, Titus K, Atayeva R, Glantz SA. Smoking in top-grossing US movies, 2015. UCSF Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education. San Francisco, CA. 6 April 2016.
The MPAA and the studios have known since 2003 that on-screen smoking is a uniquely powerful threat to children’s health. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concludes that exposure to smoking in the movies causes youth smoking. Youth-rated movies with smoking (primarily PG-13) will recruit three million young smokersin this generation and cause one million tobacco deaths.
The film industry has done little, sofar, to change that dire projection of addiction and disability. What can? An R-rating for smoking that covers every producer, director, distributor and movie would protect every child.
SOURCES:
Since 2013: On 17 December 2003, in Los Angeles, Dartmouth researcher Madeline Dalton, PhD, presented the results of the first large-scale population study of the impact of screen smoking on adolescents to production executives from each MPAA-member studio in a briefing arranged by the Motion Picture Association of America. The meeting also included several state Attorneys General and a US Senator. (SOURCE: Maryland Attorney General J. Joseph Curran to MPAA president Jack Valenti, 2 January 2004.)
CDC: US Department of Health and Human Services. Smoking in the movies: 2015. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health. Atlanta, GA. 6 April 2016.
SOURCE FOR R-RATING: The US Surgeon General reported in 2014 that eliminating most smoking in youth-rated films would reduce teen smoking rates by 18%:
US Surgeon General. The health consequences of smoking — 50 years of progress: A report of the Surgeon General. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health. Atlanta, GA. 17 January 2014. See Chapter 14, pages 872-3.
In subsequent fact sheets (see above), the CDC has reported that the R-rating would be expected to avert “one million deaths from smoking among children alive today.”
[TABLE]
Major studios’ policy loopholes expose audiences
SOURCE: UCSF CTCRE analysis of TUTD datashows what share of each major studio’s top-grossing PG-13 films included tobacco imagerywhile that studio’s tobacco depictions policy has been in effect. It also sums the in-theatertobacco impressions these PG-13 films have delivered to audiences (not including impressions from viewing the films on in-home media).
Why Fox’s effective date is estimated: Alone among the companies with tobacco depiction policies, Fox did not disclose the exact date its policy went into effect. Fox published its policy online in 2012 and we have assumed, for this analysis, that its effective date was 1 January 2012. The precise date is immaterial to overall results.
[TAG]
One little letter [R] will save a million lives.
[SPONSORS]
American Academy of Pediatrics (Chicago, IL)
American Heart Association (Dallas, TX)
American Lung Association (Washington, DC)
American Medical Association (Chicago, IL)
Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights (Berkeley, CA)
American Public Health Association (Washington, DC)
Breathe California (Sacramento, CA)
Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids (Washington, DC)
Smokefree Movies (University of California-San Francisco)
Truth Initiative (Washington, DC)
###