Has anyone else ever noticed how much time is devoted to vices in older movies?

[LostInAnomie]

I've been watching a lot of movies made in the 40's, 50's and early 60's lately, and I've noticed that A LOT of scenes in these movies are centered around smoking or drinking. Almost and inordinate amount really.

Why do you think this is? Did they really drink and smoke that much more back then than we do today?

[MonkeyFunk]

1. pretty much, yeah

When I was a kid, it was unusual to know an adult who didn't smoke. Department stores and grocery stores had ashtrays. People smoked in theaters.

It was a golden age.

[LostInAnomie]

2. What about drinking?

Seriously, in about every third scene you'll see someone getting hammered.

[JVS]

6. that was the way to spend the evening

[texanwitch]

3. I remember the smoking.

The Houston AstroDome used to have a haze when I would go there as a child.

The buses would be smokey, I don't miss the smoke.

[Connonym]

4. now showing smoking is verboten so they show violence instead

or tits :eyes:

[raccoon]

19. Seems like to me in the movies they still smoke, maybe not as much. nt

[Monk06]

5. Well back then smoking was so healthy doctors recommended it....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLOj7IrR814

[Swede]

7. I remember Ralph Bellamy in a movie talking about his vacation.

It was the best one he ever had. When they got to their destination it was raining.
The conversation went
"It was pouring outside the whole time."
"What did you do?"
"We were pouring inside."

[krispos42]

8. I watched the original "Dawn of the Dead" recently

And I was like "she's pregnant, smoking, AND drinking!!!"

:-)

[old mark]

9. I read a lot of history of the early-mid 20th century.

This is probably the most sober period in US history.
Till the mid '50's the booze bottle was very common in most offices and desk drawers in the US, drinking on the job was OK unless someone got really drunk and stupid.
And most people smoked - unfiltered Camels, Pall Malls, Chesterfield Kings, etc. Ther were ashtrays everywhere and literally nowhere was "smoke free". If there was ONE major social change to come out of the '60's, I believe it was the decrease of smoking, especially in the US.

Remember, booze and tobacco companies put up money for movie production, and many stars of the day did cigarette ads in print and radio. Smoking and drinking were seen as "sophisticated" and somehow elegant whe movie stars did it.
Big difference from today.

mark

[Crabby Appleton]

13. yep

[Arugula Latte]

21. I just read "Revolutionary Road," which, while fiction, depicts that era perfectly.

Three-Martini lunches and smoke-apalooza ...

[Chan790]

10. Do you miss it?

If so, you can follow me around with a B&W video camera...it'll be like old films what you watch the tapes. Drinking, smoking, witty flirtation, and innuendo. Not so much the rampant sexism though.

[TZ]

11. As long as you don't have the habit

of smashing citrus into women's faces....:evilgrin:
(I want to see if you get the reference)

[Chan790]

14. I don't, but...

during the reign of Louis XIV, women would rub lemons on their lips to stimulate blood-flow, reddening the lips naturally.

[Chan790]

16. Are you going to tell me?

I'm dying over here with curiosity and Google has revealed nothing.

[tainted_chimp]

17. here ya go...

and the clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4R5wZs8cxI

[Chan790]

18. D'oh!

I've actually seen that movie like 20 times too. It didn't register because I was thinking too recently. Like 1960s Hitchcock thrillers recently. Drinking, smoking, charming the women, driving cool cars, and oh yeah...something bad is going to happen. I'm obsessed with Cary Grant. He's my role model in life. Who wouldn't want to be Cary Grant? Smart, witty, charming, slightly-rakish, fashionable, funny, handsome, able, gentlemanly, and sexual.

Cagney's right up there though. I can't imagine what he'd be able to do in a less-"proper" era of film. The guy can flat-out act and he sold a character like nobody can today. The Public Enemy is the perfect example of that...it's considered one of the best portrayals of a gangster ever and there is no blood, no sex, and virtually no violence. That grapefruit is the most scandalous thing in the film.

[tainted_chimp]

22. Cary Grant is irresistible.

And he made it all look so damned easy!

But there's just something about Cagney that slays me on a primal level...that man was insanely sexy in those early films.

[monmouth]

20. Best Cagney scene evah!!..n/t

[DarkTirade]

12. Well they weren't really allowed to show sex, so they had to work with what they could show.

:)

[NashVegas]

15. They Didn't Call It "The LEISURE Class" for Nothing!

With their new-found wealth post-WW2, baby boomers' parents found all sorts of interesting ways to spend their money, what with no cell phone, internet or cable bills to pay. Or 5-7 year car loans.

I had aunts/uncles who used to regularly travel downstate (NY) to go to Copacabana and the other famous night clubs. People used to do it all the time.

It's funny how we don't imagine the parents of baby boomers/baby busters as ever having lives, themselves. It's like we think they went straight from begging on the streets during the depression to getting hopped up on valium or monitoring Cissy's pool party.

[Kutjara]

23. You don't even have to go that far back.

When I started working in banking in London in the mid-80s, it was very common to have a boozy lunch and then go back to the office for an afternoon's "work." The staff cafeteria in the old Commercial Union building had an enormous bar in it, complete with a fridge full of the most wonderful selection of wines.

Just about the only thing that made working in banking bearable was that most of the time I was tanked.

All that's gone the way of the horse and cart now, alas.

[Redstone]

24. Yes. Back then, everybody smoked everywhere, and if someone wanted to have

a drink, nobody criticized them for doing so.

And may I mention that those decades in which America, not to mention the rest of the world, had the greatest economic growth the world had ever seen?

Redstone