Scarface (1983)

Scarface (1983)

In director Brian DePalma's and Universal's over-the-top, bloody and violent gangster epic remake, its themes included crime and corruption (a parody of the "American Dream"), and gross materialistic excess. The rags-to-riches story starred Al Pacino ("Godfather" actor) as a depraved, scar-faced title character - who was redefined as a Cuban refugee-exile from Castro's Cuba to Florida in the early 1980s. He went on to become a greedy and deluded Miami cocaine trafficking drug lord and king-pin, who quickly rose to prominence, and as rapidly fell from grace.

Scripted by Oliver Stone, tribute was paid to the original film by following a similar storyline and repeating some bits of its dialogue. Like its namesake predecessor - Howard Hawks' Scarface: Shame of the Nation (1932) with a bootlegging gangster protagonist, the modern gangster remake was severely criticized for its excessive depictions of violence - especially its now-infamous chainsaw torture scene, and its outrageously bloody finale.

Pacino's over-the-top, unrestrained and operatic portrayal of the monstrous crime lord in various highly-choreographed sequences was both loved and hated. He exemplified the film's tagline: "He loved the American Dream. With a Vengeance." Much of the film's imagery and language has been co-opted by gangster rap and hip-hop. The film's memorable synthesized and electronic score and soundtrack were composed by Giorgio Moroder.

Originally X-rated (eventually released with an R rating despite having retained hundreds of F-words, and a savage chain-saw dismemberment sequence), this almost three hour-long cautionary morality tale included profanity-strewn dialogue, the gangster's incestuous liking for his sister Gina (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio), and the glamorization of drug use - portraying an excessive addiction to snorting mounds of white powdery cocaine.

To counter frequent claims that the film presented mostly negative depictions of Cuban criminals (although portrayed by non-Cuban actors, with a strong contingent of Italians), a disclaimer in the closing credits was issued: ("Scarface is a fictional account of the activities of a small group of ruthless criminals. The characters do not represent the Cuban/American community and it would be erroneous and unfair to suggest that they do. The vast majority of Cuban/Americans have demonstrated a dedication, vitality and enterprise that has enriched the American scene").

The significant cult classic, with multiple one-liners of dialogue, was financially successful - on a budget of approx. 50ドル million, it grossed 46ドル million (domestic) and 66ドル.4 million (worldwide). [Remarkably, director DePalma received a Razzie nomination for Worst Director (the honor was won by Peter Sasdy for The Lonely Lady (1983) starring Pia Zadora).]

• the opening title credits were preceded by a prologue, summarizing how Cuba's leader Fidel Castro in mid-1980 had endorsed a plan to allow 3,000 boats to leave Cuba, although part of his intent was to get rid of his country's undesirables ("the dregs of his jails"); in an historic TV clip, Castro was quoted as denouncing the Mariel Boatlift, allowing 125,000 refugees to leave Cuba: "They are unwilling to adapt to the spirit of our revolution - We don't want them! We don't need them!"; about a fifth of the refugees had criminal records

• in the summer of 1980 amongst the arriving Cuban refugees was flower-shirted Tony Montana (Al Pacino); he was questioned and interviewed by INS authorities upon his arrival in Miami; they suspected a criminal history, and ruled that he had to be sent to a refugee camp (Freedom Town), a detention center located under an Interstate 95 overpass in N. Miami
• Tony and his friend Manolo "Manny" Ribera (Steven Bauer) were promised green cards (to allow them to leave the camp) by prominent Miami cocaine dealer and kingpin Frank Lopez (Robert Loggia) if they killed ex-Cuban politician Emilio Rebenga (Roberto Contreras); after completing the hit by knifing him in the abdomen during a riot, the two were released

• shortly later while working in boring jobs at a sandwich bar, Tony and "Manny" were offered another job by one of Lopez' underlings, Omar Suarez (F. Murray Abraham) - to purchase and retrieve a shipment of Colombian cocaine in exchange for "5ドル grand"
• the day of the job, Tony and Manny were joined by Angel Fernandez (Pepe Serna) and Chi Chi (Angel Salazar); while the others waited in the car parked outside, Tony and Angel entered the cheap beachside Sun Ray Hotel to meet up with Colombian drug-dealer/trafficker Hector the Toad (Al Israel); he was with his associate or girlfriend Marta (Barbra Perez) strangely positioned on the bed next to two pillows

• inside the upstairs hotel room during a tense confrontation that foreshadowed a bad drug deal with the Colombians, (as the oblivious Manny was distracted on the street by a flirtatious blonde female, seen in an audacious and lengthy tracking shot), recent Cuban refugee Tony Montana was forced to watch as his friend Angel was grabbed from behind on the front porch by two other gang members at gunpoint, and shoved into the room; Marta threateningly uncovered a submachine gun hidden by the pillows in front of her, while Tony was also held at gunpoint from behind by Hector; Angel was forcibly led into the bathroom behind Tony, and tied by his wrists to the hotel bathroom shower rod; Tony was also led into the bathroom, where he was forced at gunpoint to witness as Angel was mutilated, arm-dismembered and chain-sawed to death (off-screen with bloody splattering and spray dotting his face, although at no time was the chainsaw seen touching his flesh); the raw humming sound of the chainsaw was drowned out by the upturned volume on the hotel room's TV; Hector finished off Angel by cutting off his leg
• Tony was then chained up to the shower rod to be next in line; he was saved from the same fate when his other two associates "Manny" Ribera and Chi Chi suddenly realized too much time had passed; they stormed the apartment with guns blazing, and Manny killed Marta and one of the gang members, although Manny was also shot; Tony shot and killed the second gang member in the bathroom, as Hector fled; Tony procured the packages of cocaine, and then was able to pursue and shoot the bloodied and limping Hector dead (execution style) out on the street in broad daylight, as onlookers watched
• after the successful transaction, although Angel lost his life (and Manny was wounded), Suarez proudly introduced Tony to his boss - Frank Lopez, who was grateful and impressed by Tony's bravado: ("You're gonna find you stay loyal in this business...you're gonna move up fast"); but he had only desultory remarks to make about his girlfriend-moll Elvira before she first appeared:
  • "Where the hell's Elvira? It's late. Go find her, will you? Jesus! F--kin' broad. She spends half her life dressing, the other half undressing. Gotta get her in-between...You gotta jump on her when she's not looking"
• most memorable was the stunning entrance scene of the icy and slinky blonde Elvira Hancock (Michelle Pfeiffer); Elvira arrived wearing a tight backless, teal-colored dress as she descended in an elevator (pictured as a doll in a glass case), and slinked over to the group of gangsters; when Frank asked about her whereabouts because he was starving and wanted to go to dinner, she sassed back: "You're always hungry. You should try starving"; she was introduced to Tony Montana, who had been eyeing her the entire time
• when Frank mentioned that he wanted to go to the decadent Babylon nightclub again for dinner, she noted:
  • "You know, Frank, if anyone wanted to assassinate you... you wouldn't be too hard to find...You never know, do you? Maybe the catcher on your Little League team."
• at the club, Frank buttered up Tony, and offered two wise words of advice (that Tony unfortunately would ignore):
  • "Lesson Number One: Don't underestimate the other guy's greed; and Lesson Number Two: Don't get high on your own supply. 'Course, not everybody follows the rules."
• in a club booth, Elvira sat facing away from the group, as Lopez promised to buy Tony new clothes to make him look sharp: "'Cause I want you to work for me"; Elvira was invited to dance with his new associate, and when they were on the dance-floor (dancing to Giorgio Moroder's tune "She's On Fire" sung by Amy Holland), Omar voiced his true opinion of Tony (obviously shared with Elvira): "I think he's a f--king peasant!"; shortly later, Elvira insulted Tony's ethnicity and intelligence as a lower-class individual: "I have enough friends, I don't need another, especially one who just got off a banana boat...Aren't you part of the Cuban crime wave?"; even so, he hinted that he was sexually-attracted to her, but that she had to give him some time; later, he told Manny: "She likes me"
• Tony expressed his life's ambitious goals to Manny: "Me, I want what's coming to me...The world, chico and everything in it....This town's like a great big p---y just waiting to get f--ked"; he wanted materialistic things: money, a boat, car, and a golf course; at a poolside resort, Tony advised Manny:
  • "This country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the women. That's why you gotta make your own moves."
• afterwards, Elvira criticized Tony's 1963 yellow Cadillac convertible, calling it like "somebody's nightmare"; in an abrupt cut, the three were inside a sports car showroom, where Tony negotiated to buy a 1979 silver Porsche 928 for 43ドルK to please her; when she rejected his idea, they retreated to his Cadillac to snort cocaine together; when he forcibly tried to kiss her, she pushed him away and emphasized: "I don't f--k around with the help...Playtime is over, okay?"

• it was five years since Tony had visited his modest home in Miami; he met with his estranged, hard-working mother (a fashion industry factory worker) and sister Gina Montana (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) (part-time beauty parlor employee and community college vocational student at Miami Dade studying cosmetology); his mother Georgina (Míriam Colón) was immediately suspicious of her dishonest son when he bragged: "Your son made it, Mama!," and offered Gina a gold engraved locket, and then gave his Ma 1,000ドル in ill-gotten cash; he lied about how he had acquired the money: ("I'm working with an anti-Castro group. I'm an organizer, and I get a lot of political contributions"); she refused the money and disowned him by calling him a "bum":
  • "I don't need your money. I work for my living. I don't want you in this house anymore! I don't want you around Gina. So, come on. Get out!"
• outside, Gina tried to calm things down by telling Tony: "You're my blood, always," and she accepted the cash that his mother had refused, as he urged: "Go ahead, go out, do some things. Have some fun"; as he drove off with his partner Manny, Tony reacted jealously when Manny expressed an interest in his sister ("She's beautiful") and ordered Manny: "Stay away from her, man. You hear? She's not for you"

• during his early association with Frank Lopez, Tony was sent to Bolivia with Omar to negotiate with crafty cocaine kingpin Alejandro Sosa (Paul Shenar), to have Lopez's organization serve as a steady and guaranteed market for 150 kilos a month (at 7ドルK per kilo); without Lopez' approval, Tony suggested a more favorable proposal with Sosa, who took a liking to Tony's straight-forward approach; the two watched as Omar was murdered by hanging from a mid-air helicopter after it was revealed that he was a police informant ("stoolie"); Tony defensively asserted that he wouldn't betray anyone, and never liked or trusted Omar anyway: ("All I have in this world is my balls and my word and I don't break 'em for no one, you understand? That piece of s--t up there, I never like him, I never trusted him. For all I know, he had me set up and had my friend, Angel Fernandez, killed")
• Tony assured Sosa that he would return and "talk to Frank and work it out? I'll fix things between us"; back in Miami in Lopez's car dealership office, Lopez was infuriated with Tony for making a deal behind his back: "You made a deal for a f--king 18ドル million dollars without even checking with me?"; Tony argued that the deal would be highly profitable: "At 10ドル.5 a key, it's puro. You can't lose money. No way. We make 75ドル million on this deal, Frank"; Lopez was suspicious about Tony: "You've been making moves on your own?"
• Tony challenged Lopez to expand his entire operation across the country: "We gotta set our own mark and enforce it. We gotta think big now," but Lopez (who implied that Tony was a "liar") refused to cooperate with Tony's suggested plans for expansion: "I want things to stay the way they are for now. You stall your deal with Sosa"; Tony was on the verge of competitively splitting with his "boss" Lopez, who warned that Tony would quickly burn out - he was one of those "guys who want it all - chicas, champagne, flash. They don't last"
• Tony's association with Frank abruptly ended: (Elvira: "I heard you and Frank aren't working together anymore"); Tony approached Frank's moll Elvira and proposed that he co-opt her (along with Frank's empire) as his own - and make her his wife:
  • "I come from the gutter. I know that....With the right woman, there's no stopping me. I could go right to the top...I want you to marry me. I want you to be the mother of my children."

• at the Babylon Club in one of the mirrored booths, Lopez's associate - corrupt narcotics police detective Mel Bernstein (Harris Yulin), offered Tony - who was now regarded as a big-time drug dealer, police protection in exchange for money as well as information on rival drug dealers: ("We tell you who's moving against you, and we shake down who you want shaken down....You feed me a bust now and then"); Tony resisted the idea of payouts: ("How do I know you're the last cop I'm gonna have to grease?"); he suspected that Lopez had put Bernstein on his trail: ("He's letting me know he's got weight on me")
• meanwhile at the same time, Tony was becoming more and more agitated watching his sister Gina flirting on the dance floor, and then retreating to the Gentlemen's rest-room to snort cocaine in a toilet-stall with her flashy male partner Fernando (Richard Delmonte); Tony assaulted them, as the furious 20 years-old Gina resisted and refused to be bossed around by her older brother: "You got some nerve, Tony...You can't tell me what to do. I'm not a baby anymore...And if I want to f--k 'em, then I'll f--k 'em!"; after Tony viciously slapped her to the floor, Manny helped to comfort her, and later while he drove her home, he explained to her how Tony was only showing her his love, caring and protectiveness; when she suggested that he take her out, Manny politely declined:
  • "Tony and I are like brothers, all right? You're his kid sister....That's where it ends. That's where it stays."
• much later at the club that evening during a comedy act performance, Tony (who was slouched down, spaced out, and sitting alone in a booth) miraculously survived a vicious assassination attempt by two hit-men; although he was shot in the left shoulder, he killed the two machine-gun attackers, fled in his car, and then phoned Manny to join him at Lopez' car dealership office in the middle of the night; Manny was interrupted in bed having sex with his busty blonde girlfriend Miriam (Sue Bowser)
• in Lopez's office, Tony suspected that his ex-boss Lopez had ordered the assault, although Frank suggested instead that it was the Diaz Brothers after the Sun Ray Hotel incident; Tony directly accused Lopez of the hit and called him an untrustworthy "cockroach": "You - a man who ain't got his word, is a cockroach"; Lopez confessed that he was responsible, and then groveled for a "second chance"; he begged Tony for his life (offering 10ドル million dollars and Elvira to save himself) and got on his knees: "You want Elvira! You can have her!"; Lopez also asserted: "I never did nothing to nobody," to which Tony retorted:
  • "No, you never did nothing to nobody. You had somebody else do it for you"

• instead of offing his ex-boss himself, Tony ordered Manny to kill Lopez: ("Manolo, shoot that piece of s--t!"); then he turned his attention toward Bernstein; he first shot him point-blank in the abdomen, and then moments later shot him in the heart ("So long, Mel. Have a good trip"); before leaving, Tony graciously offered Ernie (Arnaldo Santana), one of Frank's innocent and relieved underlings, a job with his organization
• afterwards, Tony proceeded to enter Elvira's bedroom to awaken her, and ordered her to get her "stuff" and join him; as he stood in Lopez's living room (with large glass panels) waiting for her, he viewed a blimp outside with a digital sign scrolling the message: "THE WORLD IS YOURS"

• in a brief montage to the tune of the film's theme song: "Scarface (Push It To the Limit)" by Paul Engemann (music by Giorgio Moroder), Tony proceeded to rapidly set himself up as a main distributor of Sosa's cocaine, and established numerous businesses: the Montana Management Co., the Montana Travel Co., Gina Montana's Beauty Salon, the Montana Realty Co., and more; he soon became Miami's new wealthy and powerful drug lord; he acquired a huge, heavily-guarded (with security-cameras) mansion and estate (with an outdoor zoo and wild animals), and married the sexy but callous Elvira on the mansion's outdoor grounds - making her his trophy wife; he supervised the acquisition of fancy new clothes for his beloved sister Gina

• both Tony and Elvira were becoming lonely, isolated, and addicted coke-heads; the new Miami drug kingpin was also increasingly volatile, angry, distrustful of everyone and paranoid as he faced numerous problems; Jerry (Dennis Holahan), the respectable bank manager where he was laundering money was complaining and insisting on raising rates, and Tony had moved his money elsewhere for laundering, following Manny's recommendation for an alternative; still, Tony was living a favored life of luxury - bathing in a huge tub while watching TV
• his relationship with Elvira was rapidly deteriorating - he called her a "Bubblehead" and asked: "You ever do nothing besides get your hair fixed and powder your nose? Look at you. You do too much of that s--t"; they frequently argued:
  • Elvira: "Can't you stop saying f--k all the time? Can't you stop talking about money? It's boring, Tony."
    Tony: "Where's this comin' from? Boring? What's boring?"
    Elvira: "You're boring."
• Elvira also resorted to name-calling: "You're an immigrant spic millionaire who can't stop talking..."; Tony countered by calling her lazy and unproductive: "You got nothin' to do with your life. Why don't you get a job or somethin', you know? Do something. Be a nurse", and for not being any good in bed; Tony even resorted to calling his trusted friend Manny a "junior partner"; Manny had enough and called Tony an "a--hole" before storming out; Tony was left alone in his tub muttering to himself: "I don't need him. I don't need her. F--k them. I don't need nobody"
• Tony's operation was caught up in a sting operation, led by Tony's newly-hired mob-connected Jewish money launderer named Siedelbaum (Ted Benavides) after he had broken ties with Jerry the Banker; Siedelbaum was revealed to be an undercover law enforcement officer who arrested Tony and revealed there was an ongoing sting operation with a hidden camera (in his clock); Tony was to be charged with tax evasion and money laundering (of 1ドル.3 million undeclared dollars); Tony confidently claimed that his high-priced Miami lawyer George Sheffield (Michael Alldredge) would ruin Siedelbaum's career (and send him to work in Alaska - "Dress warm")
• however, as it turned out, Tony's case was before the United States Tax Court, where he faced an actual term of three years in prison; Tony was incensed: "I'm not going back in any cage, okay?"; Sheffield promised to delay the trial and sentencing, but it wasn't enough for Tony
• to keep his business thriving and to listen to a proposal to save him, Tony met again with his Colombian cocaine supplier Alex Sosa; in exchange for having Tony avoid prison time (arranged with his "friends in Washington") although he would still be facing back-taxes and penalties, Sosa commissioned Tony to murder a Bolivian journalist in New York City who was about to expose Sosa's empire
• upon his return to Miami, Tony, Manny and Elvira went out to dinner, and Tony was drunkenly refusing to tell them why he had to visit New York the following week; in a stunning monologue, he crudely described how Elvira had turned into a disgusting, full-time junkie:
  • "Is this it? That's what it's all about, Manny? Eating, drinking, f--king, sucking?...Snorting? Then what? Now what? You're 50. You got a bag for a belly. You got tits, you need a bra. They got hair on 'em. You got a liver, they got spots on it, and you're eatin' this f--kin' s--t, you're lookin' like these rich f--kin' mummies in here....That's what it's all about... That's what I work for? Look at that. A junkie. I got a f--kin' junkie for a wife. She don't eat nothin'. Sleeps all day with them black shades on. Wakes up with a Quaalude, and who won't f--k me 'cause she's in a coma. I can't even have a kid with her, Manny. Her womb is so polluted, I can't even have a f--kin' little baby with her!"
• Elvira turned vicious and threw her glass of water at him: ("How dare you talk to me like that! What makes you so much better than me?...You deal drugs and you kill people. That's wonderful, Tony. Real contribution to human history....Can't you see what we're becoming, Tony? We're losers. We're not winners, we're losers"); she vowed to leave him forever: "I'm leaving you. I don't need this s--t anymore"
• after they had created a scene in the restaurant, Tony turned around to denounce the other patrons in the restaurant as he stumbled out:
  • "What you lookin' at? You're all a bunch of f--kin' assholes. You know why? You don't have the guts to be what you wanna be. You need people like me. You need people like me so you can point your f--kin' fingers and say: 'That's the bad guy.' So, what does that make you? Good? You're not good. You just know how to hide, how to lie. Me, I don't have that problem. Me, I always tell the truth. Even when I lie. So say good night to the bad guy! Come on. The last time you gonna see a bad guy like this again, let me tell ya. Come on. Make way for the bad guy. There's a bad guy comin' through! Better get out of his way!"
• during the attempt on the journalist's life in NY, the presence of the man's wife with her two children in their white 1972 Citroën DS prevented Tony from carrying through on the order to kill him; he told Sosa's 'disposer' Alberto the Shadow (Mark Margolis) accompanying him in the front passenger seat: "You think I kill two kids and a woman? F--k that! I don't need that s--t in my life"; he shot Alberto in the head to prevent him from pressing a car-bomb detonator button, and then rationalized to himself: "What do you think I am, huh? You think I'm a f--kin' worm like you?"
• for his disobedience, Sosa turned on Tony for cancelling the 'contract' and not eliminating the journalist:
  • "My partners are pissed off, Tony...There's not gonna be a next time, you f--king dumb c--ksucker! You blew it!...I told you a long time ago, you f--kin' little monkey, not to f--k me!"
• upon his return, Tony briefly met with his mother to find out about the missing Gina's whereabouts; as he left, she was upset at his destructive nature: "Why do you have to destroy everything that comes your way?"; Tony visited with Gina at her fancy Coconut Grove house on Citrus Drive (paid for by Tony's generosity); at the door, he became insanely jealous when he saw skimpily-dressed Gina in a nightgown on an upstairs balcony; senselessly murdered Manny (with Gina present), not knowing at the time that Gina had just married him: "We got married just yesterday. We were gonna surprise you"; Tony fled the scene, taking Gina with him

• just before the film's visceral shootout ending, as Tony returned to his gated mansion, simultaneously, vengeful Bolivian kingpin Sosa's thugs were secretly infiltrating into the grounds of his compound; Gina was dragged into the mansion and force-fed tranquilizers to calm her down
• the Miami gangster was seated before a huge amount of cocaine (lying in white powdery stacks on his office desk), while ignoring views on his security camera TVs of his rival's killers entering the complex and murdering his security guards just outside his office; guilt-ridden, he rhetorically asked himself: "How the f--k I do that, Manny?"
• he was interrupted by his heavily-drugged sister Gina - still wearing her open purple gown with only panties; she entered his mansion's office - at first acting seductively and taunting him by offering her deadly self:
  • "Is this what you want, Tony? Huh, Tony? You can't stand for another man to be touching me. So you want me, Tony, huh? Huh?...Oh, is that it? Huh? (Chuckling to herself) Here I am, Tony"
• actually, she was enraged and intent on retaliating for Tony's earlier assassination of his own associate and her newly-wed husband, Manny Ribera; she drew a pistol and fired at Tony:
  • "I am all yours now, Tony, you see? I'm all yours now. (Another shot struck some cocaine on his desk)... (Giggling) You better come and get me now, Tony...Come and get me, Tony, come on. come on. Come and get me, Tony. You do it now, before it's too late."
• one of Gina's many shots struck Tony in the leg as she came closer and closer ("Oh, come on, Tony. F--k me, huh? F--k me, Tony!") - he cowered behind his desk chair; suddenly, Sosa's gunman-thug who had snuck onto the balcony burst into the room and killed Gina with a blast of machine-gun fire; Tony charged the killer, tossed him into the plaza's fountain below, and riddled his body with bullets: ("Die, Die!"); Tony realized what was happening as his courtyard filled with Sosa's armed men, but then, he paused for a moment to hold Gina's dead body; he lamented over her loss and pitilessly tried to apologize:
  • "Please talk to me. Don't be mad at me. Please. Gina. Come on. I love Manny, you know? I love him....And I love you, too, you know? Gimme a smile....You wait here, OK? I'll be with you. I'll be back. You wait for me. I'm coming back, OK?"
• after briefly glancing at his closed-circuit TV surveillance monitors, the coke-convulsed Tony knew he was surrounded in his second floor office and forced to take a one-man stand in the bloody finale against overwhelming odds; he uttered a famous challenge against the "cockroaches" with his super-charged M16 assault weapon (and grenade launcher) in his hands at the top of the stairs - tempting the assassins raiding his mansion:
  • "OK. You wanna play rough? OK. Say hello to my little friend!"
• he shot down gunmen crouched outside his door; he taunted: "You want more?"; emerging from his office, he sprayed everyone in sight with bullets, although he was wounded in the left shoulder; and then when he was hit a few more times, he tried to shield himself with the bodies of the dead littering the floor around him
• after killing almost all his opponents, Tony shouted:
  • "You think you can take me? You need a f--kin' army you're gonna take me! Ya hear? Come on! I take you all to f--kin' hell...Who do you think you f--kin' with? I Tony Montana! You f--k with me, you f--kin' with the best"

• daring to be shot ("I take your f--kin' bullets!"), Tony was gunned down by a barrage of fire from his staircase lobby; with one final point-blank shotgun blast in the back administered by Skull (Geno Silva), Sosa's personal assassin, Tony's bullet-ridden body crashed down one story from the top of his staircase into his indoor fountain, where ironically, his corpse floated in front of a statue with the neon slogan in pink letters:
  • "The World Is Yours."