SYDNEY -- A television interview that featured Oscar-winner Russell Crowe puffing on a cigarette has sparked an expensive legal row in Australia.

The actor, who played a tobacco industry whistle-blower in the movie "The Insider", was filmed lighting up in the dying moments of an interview with the nine network's "60 Minutes" program, AFP reported.

The Australian broadcasting authority decided the footage breached the tobacco advertisement prohibition act and gave the television station a ticking off without imposing any fines.

The station, owned by Australia's richest man and heavy smoker Kerry Packer, appealed to the Federal Court on Wednesday for the decision to be reconsidered.

It was represented by nine lawyers, including two senior barristers, in the culmination of a battle estimated to have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees.

The broadcasting authority argued "Crowe's celebrity and fame meant that members of the general public who saw the interview might seek to emulate him".

Nine's lawyers said it was impossible to screen the interview, meant to capture the knockabout, behind-the-scenes Crowe, without including the smoking footage.

The court is expected to hand down its decision today.

It is not the first time Crowe's behavior has created headlines.

Last month, two men were found not guilty of trying to blackmail the "Gladiator" star by offering a surveillance video of the actor involved in a brawl outside a nightclub near his rural retreat of Coffs Harbor.

And in February, he gave a British television producer an ear-bashing for cutting short his acceptance speech at an awards ceremony when he started reciting poetry.