The main contention most critics had with the film was its lack of continuity. Karina Longworth of Cinematical notes ""Thank You for Smoking" has a vague emotional arc, but narratively it plays out like a constellation of sitcom sketches, connected by the most tenuous threads of character evolution", while "Empire" observes "the problem's not so much with the movie's aim, as with the number of targets it's aiming at." Other reviewers criticized the film's overacting. Manohla Dargis of "The New York Times" notes "although he steers his cast through its paces with facility, he tends to oversell jokes that were already plenty loud in the book." Other comments come from "The Hollywood Reporter": "While often entertaining, the film keeps hitting the same comic notes", and Salon: "The actors here are entertaining enough to watch, even if they sometimes seem to be taking their mission (whatever they think it is) a bit too seriously."