I can think of two movies that influenced popular culture in ways their creators probably never intended or even wanted: Star Wars and Scarface. I knew almost all the key lines from Scarface before watching it: “say hello to my little friend,” “make way for the bad guy," and my favourite: “In 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,” largely due to its spoofing on The Simpsons. Scarface also did for hip hop what no other film has done since. It basically gave rappers like Nas, Jay-Z and the Geto Boys a blueprint for how to not only craft their music, but their lives. Some of the classic rap albums of all time not only cite dialog from the movie, but share some of the same themes as well. There’s not a whole lot of this movie I didn’t know about before watching it, which sort of lessened the impact for me. After all, Scarface is considered one of the best gangster movies of all time, popular with fans to this day. And yet it all felt so underwhelming.
The reason I think, other than my prior-knowledge of the plot, dialog, etc., is that it’s been eclipsed by better gangster movies. Goodfellas and Donnie Brasco were way better at depicting the gangster life. Henry Hill’s rise through the mob ranks in Goodfellas, with all the excess that came with it and his eventual downfall, is engaging from start to finish and never grows stale. Donnie Brasco showed the drudgery of the gangster lifestyle, and is probably the only gangster movie not to glamorize its subject. On the small screen, The Sopranos showed a mafia don dealing with existential angst. All share similarities - the violent, sociopathic and outright immoral nature of the mobster is inherent in each film, but the three examples above handle it in new and exciting ways. And all have a timeless quality to them. I always sit and watch Goodfellas whenever it's on, even when network censors have their way with it.
Scarface, however, is dated. It’s firmly rooted in the 80’s, not just in terms of the era it depicts but also the style. The 80's hair aside, that soundtrack is grating. More annoying is the ridiculous montage that was a staple of 80’s films. It’s hard to create a timeless classic when you’re so rooted in a particular decade.
One interesting plotline in Scarface involving Tony Montana’s almost incestuous obsession with his sister Gina (a prime Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) held out promise, but it too feels out of place and goofy. Maybe it’s all the tight close-ups of Pacino’s eyes and that synthesizer blaring in your ears every time he sees her with another man, but it just felt wrong the entire time.
This movie never hits the right note, except when it comes to the violence, for which this movie excels at a great deal. I have no complaints when it comes to the body count. I expected it to be more violent in fact. The action scenes in this movie are some of the best, the finale as compelling today as it was in 1983. But as far as this being a complex portrayal of a gangster, it’s two decades past its expiry date.
