The story told in "Addiction Incorporated" may not be new, but the film's subject, a whistle-blowing research scientist who played a key role in the fight to regulate tobacco, deserves to be celebrated.

The scientist is experimental psychologist Victor DeNoble, who was hired in the 1980s by Philip Morris to come up with a way to make cigarettes safer. DeNoble found not only that nicotine is undeniably addictive — the lab rats he used became so hooked that they would self-administer 90 doses a day — but he uncovered another tobacco element, acetaldehyde, that was even more habit-forming.

This was a major problem for the tobacco industry when it was still contending that its products were not addictive. DeNoble had sent his findings to a scholarly journal but was ordered by his employer to withdraw the paper, and was later fired.

Pressure continued to build on the industry. In 1994, the FDA began investigating it, as did Congress, which released DeNoble from his confidentiality agreement with Philip Morris, allowing him to deliver damaging testimony. The congressional hearings became notorious when the CEOs of seven tobacco firms all denied, under oath, that nicotine was habit-forming.

DeNoble now spends much of his time trying to educate young people about the dangers of tobacco.

Filmmaker Charles Evans Jr. employs an annoying trick: frequently cutting to unnecessary animated segments starring anthropomorphized rats. Otherwise, "Addiction Incorporated" is a straightforward, effective mix of talking heads and newsreel footage.