Al Pacino is the man

Rating: Null/10 (7 February 2018)

In many ways Scarface, a remake of a 1932 film of the same name, is the next logical step from movies such as The Godfather trilogy, Once Upon a Time in America and Goodfellas. All those gangster films take place in the early decades of the 20th century and heavily feature mafia or at least gangs closely associated with them. Whereas Scarface takes place in Florida in the 1980s and features Cuban and South American drug lords. Where the crime in those first mentioned films can be seen as civilized, code-bound and even somewhat admirable, Scarface lifts away the thin veneer of civility and throws us straight to the wolves.
Tony Montana (Al Pacino) is a Cuban refugee working to rise to the top of the Florida drug business. His rough, uneducated manners constantly clash with those around him, but no one can claim he doesn't get results. But despite all his success he is a man deeply immersed in vice and eventually those start to consume his every waking hour.
Scarface has been called cheesy. It's been called excessive, brutal and gory. It's been called clichéd. And it's all those things, but what these critics fail to realize is the fact that it's meant to be all those. As I said, it's the next step. A gangster film where the main character doesn't hide the fact he's a completely irredeemable monster poorly disguising himself as a human being. And yet in Pacino's amazing hands even a character such as this one can have charisma, can pull us in. We still don't like him, but we can grudgingly respect his success.
It's an ugly film. It's also charismatic, brutal, beautifully shot and well-acted. It features some truly memorable song tracks and has influenced an entire generation of film makers. Whether you like it or not, you cannot deny it its place in our cultural consciousness.