See It. See It. See It.

"Thank You For Smoking" is evil, and hilarious. I've always felt that the best satire doesn't have to embellish much, just reveal the logic behind a socially or politically ridiculous attitude.

This movie, about a tobacco industry lobbyist, is clever and original. But its fundamental logic comes from the real attitudes and rhetoric from real lobbyists.

Sure, it gets pretty absurd at the end. But you gotta remember, so did Jonathan Swift (1667-1745), who, in addition to writing "Gulliver's Travels," wrote the classic satire "A Modest Proposal," suggesting that people eat their young. The absurdity of this movie is the true-to-life absurdity of our product-placement, stay-on-message world.

The film satirizes not just lobbyists, but the news media, Hollywood, corporate and political interests of many stripes. With characters who are archetypes of our modern advocacy system (the corporate shill, the self-important politician, etc., ), it's the dialogue that sharply slices up our society's foibles, without turning the show into a mere talkfest. Besides, you simply have to see Rob Lowe playing Michael Ovitz.


Christopher Buckley, who wrote the book the film is based on, and Jason Reitman, the director, (and yes, the son of Ivan "Stripes" "Ghostbusters" "Twins" and "Dave" Reitman) clearly understand plenty about how power works in our society, and in this pared down, simple and brash comedy, repeatedly hit the nail on the head. And on the funny bone.