I never realized how many people disliked Brian De Palma’s SCARFACE until I saw that UNpopular Opinion column posted back in June. I’ll admit it. I was one of those people who had a Scarface poster in their room. It was an art print made up different lines from the movie that ended up forming a relaxed Tony Montana against that tropical sunset wallpaper. I’ve since retired that print and my herbal refreshment but will always have a special place in my heart for it.
September was the last time we got any news on the mesh revisioning of the 1932 and 1983 versions of SCARFACE. Now it looks like a writer is finally attached to tackle this damn thing. TRAINING DAY scribe David Ayer will take both of the films and create something of a “contemporary crime context”.
Ayer is looking forward to coming up with a marriage of the two, “This is a fantasy for me, I can still remember when I saw the film at 13 and it blew my mind. I sought it out; I went after it hard. I see it as the story of the American dream, with a character whose moral compass points in a different direction. That puts it right in my wheelhouse. I studied both the original Ben Hecht-Howard Hawks movie and the DePalma-Pacino version and found some universal themes. I’m still under the hood figuring out the wiring that will translate, but both films had a specificity of place, there was unapologetic violence, and a main character who socially scared the shit out of people, but who had his own moral code. Each was faithful to the underworld of its time. There are enough opportunities in the real world today that provide an opportunity to do this right. If it was just an attempt to remake the 1983 film, that would never work.”