Scarface

Scarface (1932)

Timing: 1:33 (93 min)

7.451/10
575

7.601/10
9702

7.7/10
33000

All about film

Video 3

Photo 18

Actors and characters

Release date

1932-04-09

Country

United States

Production

United Artists, The Caddo Company

Genre

Crime, Drama, Romance

Budget

$0

Revenue

$600 000

Website

Director

Howard Hawks

Actors

Paul Muni, Ann Dvorak, Karen Morley, Osgood Perkins, C. Henry Gordon, George Raft, Vince Barnett, Boris Karloff, Purnell Pratt, Tully Marshall
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Howard Hawks, Howard Hughes

Operator

Lee Garmes

Composer

Adolph Tandler

Artist

Audition

Editing

Edward Curtiss
All team (25)

• The film's screenwriter, Ben Hecht, previously worked as a journalist in Chicago and was well acquainted with many gangsters, including Al Capone. Even during filming, Hecht once returned to his hotel room in Los Angeles and found two of Al Capone's henchmen there. They asked him if the film was really about Al Capone. Hecht assured them it was not, saying that he had created the image of Tony Camonte based on two other gangsters – Jim Colosimo and Charles Dion O'Banion. “Then why is the film called ‘Scarface?’,” one of the gangsters asked. “Everyone will think it’s about Al Capone.” “That’s the whole point,” Hecht replied. “People will think the film is about Al Capone, and they will definitely go see it. That’s the law of show business.” This answer completely satisfied the gangsters.
• To give the narrative the inexorability of an ancient Greek tragedy, Hawks decided to add an 'X' to each scene, which was used in newspaper reports on murders to mark the location of the corpse. This is exactly the shape of Camonte's scar, and throughout the film, from the opening credits to the finale, this sign appears dozens of times, in the most unexpected places. The crew was promised a reward of one hundred dollars for the most ingenious suggestions on how to 'encode' the X into a scene.
• It is rumored that Al Capone liked the painting so much that he even kept a copy of it at home.
• The film was re-released in 1979.
• In 1994, the film was added to the National Film Registry.
• Censors were unhappy with the depiction of the criminal world in the film; they also disliked its ending. A different finale was then filmed, in which Tony is arrested by the police, then tried, convicted, and executed. The scene of Tony's sister's death was also re-edited, as his feelings for her did not seem particularly brotherly. However, these changes did not satisfy the censors, and director Howard Hawks decided to return to the original version. The film was released without censorship approval, but to minimize complaints, a politically correct subtitle, “A Disgrace to the Nation,” was added to the title.
• To imbue the narrative with the inexorability of ancient Greek tragedy, Hawks decided to add an 'X' to every scene, the same mark used in newspaper reports of murders to indicate the location of the body. This is the shape of Camonte's scar, and throughout the film, from the opening to the closing credits, this sign appears dozens of times in the most unexpected places. The crew was promised a $100 reward for the most ingenious suggestions on how to 'encode' the 'X' into various scenes.