Thank You for Smoking: A-

Tragedy is one of the most powerful influences a movie can have. True story with a hero who drug himself up from the gutters because of a coke whore mother? Reeks of tragedy! Or perhaps a serial kill documentary that investiages the mind of a criminal whose great uncle didn't love him enough? Genius! Tragedy is the one emotion that seeks to both divide and congregate: we shrink from it as much as it is relatable. And cigarettes, as much as anything, can cause tragedy. They spread cancer, depression, disease, and civil unrest wherever they're little white forms are to be found. People loathe cigarettes so strongly that the very mention of Malboro can send someone into flights of rage so exquisite it beguiles Mike Tyson. But how about the other side of the story? What about the people that represent tobacco, in all of its tainted glory, and the blood money it stands atop? Let consider them.

Nick Naylor (Aaron Eckhart) talks and he's good at talking, very good. Nick talks for Big Tobacco. Big Tobacco talks for 55 million smokers in America and countless more in the world. Big Tobacco talks and Big Tobacco makes money and Nick "pays the mortage". Nick is the central character in a grounded satire about the relationship between lobysists and the varying vices they represent that is alternately uproarious and touching. Uproarious for the script from first time writer-director Jason Reitman and touching because Nick actually has a soul.

Though the entire movie is about how Nick deals with a sort of mid-life crisis over what he does and how it affects his son Joey, the real subject of focus is liberty and the movie makes a darn good case of why anti-tobacco ads are just as harmful to us as citizens as pro-tobacco ads. The best satirists are truly devoted to the very subject they mock and Reitman is obviously quite devoted to civil liberties. Though it is a cutting indictment of lunacy in contemporary society that revolves around the captivating performance of Aaron Eckhart, it's also a heartwarming, soul filling, feel good picture. Let's not forget Rob Lowe, Maria Bello, and David Koechner, kudos them for their suprisingly funny turns as an eccentric Super Agent, an Alcohol lobbyist and a Gun lobbysist respectively. Though it is easily one of the best comedies of the year it is also the smartest. As Nick Naylor might say: don't take my word for it though, see for yourself.