Scarface (Howard Hawks, 1932)
It’s strange to find Scarface absent from the AFI 100, though it was one of the 400 films nominated for inclusion and is featured on their list of Top 10 Gangster films. Along with Pubic Enemy and Little Caesar, Scarface is one of the most influential gangster pictures of the 1930’s, which is no doubt why Jonathan Rosenbaum sought to include it on his alternate 100. Prior to Scarface, I’d seen four of Hawks’s films (Bringing Up Baby, His Girl Friday, The Big Sleep, and Red River), so I was aware of his great versatility in terms of genre and adeptness with quick, witty dialogue. While I can’t claim to be a huge Hawks fan, his films are always been worth watching–practically unavoidable if you like Golden Age cinema.
Of course, you probably know the story already: gangster Tony Camonte, nicknamed Scarface, works his way up the crime ladder and isinevitably destroyed by his own greed and egotism. Scarface is played by Paul Muni, whose fascinating performance serves as the film’s center. His Tony Camonte is a brutish ape-like child, for whom violence elicits a sick joy. The perverseness of the character is heightened by a nearly incestuous concern for his sharp-talking sister (played by Ann Dvorak). The cast is rounded out by a variety of mostly solid players, including Boris Karloff as the rival gang boss Osgood Perkins (father of Anthony Perkins) as the Johnny Lovo, as the gang boss Scarface works under and will eventually overthrow. Karen Morley plays Lovo’s girl, Poppy. She is given little more to do than look pretty and act a bit tough, but the first meeting between Poppy and Scarface is mildly provocative for the period, as she is clearly Lovo’s unmarried kept mistress, introduced in nothing more than a silk slip.
At the time of its release, Scarface was provocative and violent enough that it did not pass muster with some regional censors. Several scenes were “cleaned up,” and an alternate ending was added, but Hawks and producer Howard Hughes were so unsatisfied with the results that they opted instead to show the original cut in cities with less strict censor boards. While the alternate ending included on the DVD punishes Camonte far more severely and leaves no question as to his immoral character, the original cut is not lacking in the overt moralization lacking in more recent gangster/crime films. The intro title card informs us that:
This picture is an indictment of gang rule in America and of the callous indifference of the government to this constantly increasing menace to our safety and our liberty.
A later conversation between the cops investigating and containing the gang war further bolsters this message, in addition to the characterization of Tony Camonte as an overgrown and egotistical child with a big gun responsible for his own downfall. Yet the film was (and, among some, continues to be) controversial for its realistic, at times fun, depiction of violence. Hawks’ gritty, ambivalent approach to the violence is much of what speaks to the contemporary viewer, in addition to its influence on filmmakers like Godard and Scorsese.
The violence and overall look of the film no doubt influenced the film noir of the 40’s and 50’s as well. Hawks makes brilliant use of light and shadow, particularly in the opening sequence in which we are introduced to Tony Camonte as only a shadow on the wall. The sequence leading up to Camonte’s death makes equally good use of chiaroscuro by way of police spotlight. Perhaps the most memorable image in the film is of the neon sign for a travel agency that reads “THE WORLD IS YOURS,” in which Camonte sees a reflection of his own desires, a dark shadow of the American Dream. Eventually, the sign serves as a blatant and ironic antithesis of those desires.
Despite the thin use of sound that plagues many films of the 30’s and the occasionally dated style of acting, Scarface is an engrossing film that transcends its age. I had not expected to like it quite as much as I did, but I came away quite impressed. Besides deserving its status as an influential classic, it’s an effectively ambivalent portrayal of both the glamor and foolishness of criminal culture in American society.
Tags: crime, fate, gangsters, The American Dream, tragedy