MovieChat Forums > The Big Heat (1953) Discussion > I know smoking is de rigeur for film noi...

I know smoking is de rigeur for film noir, but....

posted 11 years ago by millerdsplaydzign
10 replies | jump to latest

Glenn Ford's wife belching smoke into the air like a Chinese factory while she cooks his steak, then waving her ashy cig back and forth over the plate as she puffs out a fresh cloud of smog directly onto his entree as she serves it to him was just gross. I kept seeing Peggy Bundy from Married With Children. He: Um, honey, remember when I told you I don't like that much pepper on my steak? She: Don't worry. It's not pepper; it's just the ashes off my ciggy.

[–] thbryn 11 years ago

You are correct sir. Around the 150'th inhale in this smokeathon I started to feel queasy (not kidding). It was too much...even for the 50's.

Kisskiss, Bangbang

[–] eelb 11 years ago

They didn't know back then, what we know now. Smoking was part of the culture, and no one gave a second thought about it. People even enjoyed the smell to some extent.

[–] gsfsu 10 years ago

Bull Roar! In some of the Three Stooges shorts of the 1930's they refer to cigarettes as "coffin nails". Although they probably didn't know what we know today they definitely knew ciggies would kill you.

[–] eelb 10 years ago

That wasn't the general consensus of the day. It was generally thought of the way alcohol is now. Detrimental to good health, but in moderation not directly attributable to cancer and death. When the scientific link to cancer was discovered in 1964, that's when tobacco began to lessen in society.

[–] mdonln 10 years ago

eelb says > Smoking was part of the culture, and no one gave a second thought about it. People even enjoyed the smell to some extent.

I agree with you about the culture. There may have been a few people who were against it or refrained from smoking for health reasons or because they didn't like the smell or effects of smoking, but most thought it was perfectly fine.

I've seen all sides presented in these older movies. In fact, some people, as you say, associated positive things with smoking like enjoying the smell and thinking a cigarette relaxed them. Oddly, there may have been some truth to the relaxing part. Until they had trouble breathing from the buildup of soot in their lungs, taking deep breaths in and slowly releasing them might have been very calming. They just should have done it sans cigarette.

Woman, man! That's the way it should be Tarzan. [Tarzan and his mate]

[–] spookyrat1 10 years ago

Interesting feature with this movie I noticed is that a lot of the characters kept putting cigarettes down on table and desk tops, without using ash trays, including the Bannions. Imagine all the scorch marks on the furniture.🐭

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] ridge-m-1 10 years ago

Advice to film watchers, if you have been so brain-washed that even the sight of people smoking in a movie offends you, stay the hell away from viewing film noir.

These, for the most part B crime dramas from the 40's and 50's, represent American society realistically. Some of the leads in these films actually chain-smoke their way through the entire picture. Check out "True Detective Season 1" for a modern day equivalent. That mini-series has several neo noir elements all the way through the production including modern day femme fatales.

Think of it this way, people were free to enjoy themselves during the period of classic noir films. Lots of booze out in the open, many times partaken of while on the job and certainly lots of drinking and driving. There was no place that a man or a woman could not smoke and there are no kids around to get in the way and bug. It's a world for adults which this film noir aficionado vastly prefers over the Nanny State we all currently reside in.

[–] ibbi 9 years ago

I love it. Maybe gross, but certainly watching it in this day and age it so totally flies in the face of the perfect image of the 50s housewife that most people have. Fritz Lang was a special one.

________
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-21AtiWV3TE

[–] jlam888 8 years ago

You should see Lang's M, then :-)