Selling Out: A Brief, Highly Selective History of Product Placement at the Movies

Rebel Without a Cause (1955)
When James Dean used an Ace comb in Nicolas Ray's teen-angst milestone, suddenly every cool dude had to have one too. (On its company website, Ace even features Rebel as a turning point in its history.) That same year, Bell potato chips appeared in The Seven Year Itch, only to be outshone by the stars — with Marilyn Monroe holding that bag of chips, they hardly stood a chance.

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