When you go back and watch Scarface and Carlito's Way, it really is like night and day with how Carlito's Way is the better movie

[re'up]

when the movie was released, it was heavily panned.

it gain a cult following when hip hop adopted it

Mainly because of the violence and language, as funny as that sounds 40 years later.

Most times the word fukk was used

Most extreme violence in cinema at the time

The chainsaw scene

It was supposed to be X Rated, Ebert's review is one reflection of what it's reception was at the time.

 

[re'up]

Here is Ebert's review at the time in 1983, Stone and De Palma were at the height or ascent of their careers when this came out.

Scarface movie review & film summary (1983) | Roger Ebert

The interesting thing is the way Tony Montana stays in the memory, taking on the dimensions of a real, tortured person. Most thrillers use interchangeable characters, and most gangster movies are more interested in action than personality, but "Scarface" is one of those special movies, like "The...

www.rogerebert.com

The interesting thing is the way Tony Montana stays in the memory, taking on the dimensions of a real, tortured person. Most thrillers use interchangeable characters, and most gangster movies are more interested in action than personality, but "Scarface" is one of those special movies, like "The Godfather," that is willing to take a flawed, evil man and allow him to be human. Maybe it's no coincidence that Montana is played by Al Pacino, the same actor who played Michael Corleone.

Montana is a punk from Cuba. The opening scene of the movie informs us that when Cuban refugees were allowed to come to America in 1981, Fidel Castro had his own little private revenge -- and cleaned out his prison cells, sending us criminals along with his weary and huddled masses. We see Montana trying to bluff his way through an interrogation by US federal agents, and that's basically what he'll do for the whole movie: bluff. He has no real character and no real courage, although for a short time cocaine gives him the illusion of both.

Al Pacino does not make Montana into a sympathetic character, but he does make him into somebody we can identify with, in a horrified way, if only because of his perfectly understandable motivations. Wouldn't we all like to be rich and powerful, have desirable sex partners, live in a mansion, be catered to by faithful servants -- and hardly have to work? Well, yeah, now that you mention it. Dealing drugs offers the possibility of such a lifestyle, but it also involves selling your soul.

Montana gets it all and he loses it all. That's predictable. What is original about this movie is the attention it gives to how little Montana enjoys it while he has it. Two scenes are truly pathetic; in one of them, he sits in a nightclub with his blond mistress and his faithful sidekick, and he's so wiped out on cocaine that the only emotions he can really feel are impatience and boredom. In the other one, trying for a desperate transfusion of energy, he plunges his face into a pile of cocaine and inhales as if he were a drowning man.

 

[nose hair]

Mainly because of the violence and language, as funny as that sounds 40 years later.

Most times the word fukk was used

Most extreme violence in cinema at the time

The chainsaw scene

It was supposed to be X Rated, Ebert's review is one reflection of what it's reception was at the time.

yeah, but the point is it was heavily panned in real time, lol

 

[Ed MOTHERFUCKING G]

"it wasn't supposed to be a serious movie" when is Brian de palma out here bullshytting? it was a serious movie to all parties involved

 

[re'up]

Haven't read this review in years, Ebert totally got the movie. Wow.

 

[Ed MOTHERFUCKING G]

Haven't read this review in years, Ebert totally got the movie. Wow.

Yeah, his reading of the movie is incredibly accurate...wow

 

[Erratic415]

I always laughed at how much cocaine he was able to ingest. He had a fukking mountain of blow he would shove his face into.

It was like coke allowed him to stand up to fully automatic assault weapons

 

[Erratic415]

yeah, but the point is it was heavily panned in real time, lol

I think it was fairly mixed. Roger Ebert loved it, Leonard Maltin hated it. I remember I used to read this film review book as a kid, it was done by a duo, and they loved it.

People might forget, but Casino kind of got mixed reviews at the time as well. It was only 5 years after Goodfellas, and a lot of critics felt it was just a weak version of it.

But after time, it’s gotten its due.

Sharon Stone always got praise for her performance though.

 

[re'up]

I know what Stone and De Palma were going for, lot of symbolism, even if they will insist that's what guys were doing----ingesting that much near pure cocaine that quickly would be an instant overdose, like three grams going right into your nose in three seconds would probably kill you.

Always thought the better scene would have been him opening up one single package kilo and just doing it off the brick. Cocaine always always comes in kilo bricks. Not trash bags of powder. Maybe bales of bricks, but it's always in bricks. Even in the 80's, the Colombians sent kilos, and they weren't powder, I don't think, it would have been like pasty flake yellow fishscale.

More realistic, less cheesy, but it wasn't that kind of movie.

 

[nose hair]

I think it was fairly mixed. Roger Ebert loved it, Leonard Maltin hated it. I remember I used to read this film review book as a kid, it was done by a duo, and they loved it.

People might forget, but Casino kind of got mixed reviews at the time as well. It was only 5 years after Goodfellas, and a lot of critics felt it was just a weak version of it.

But after time, it’s gotten its due.

Sharon Stone always got praise for her performance though.

Yeah

I remember De Palma speaking on it I think it was on a documentary about Scarface but he was saying how it was panned when it came out and of course we know how much hip hop gravitated towards it

 

[ShaDynasty]

Very different films. I used to absolutely prefer Carlitos Way, but having seen Scarface recently, I wouldn't choose between them. And yeah, I hated Carlitos girlfriend. Wack actress imo. Someone should AI her out of the flick and put Pfeiffer there instead.

Scarface actually has its share of intelligence and social commentary through the Oliver Stone script. The script is genuinely funny, but grim, and Pacino's performance will never not be entertaining. Every second of that movie goes hard.