Trivia and Quotes
Quotes
 Francesca `Cesca` Camonte: You`re a butcher! That`s what you are! You`re a butcher!
Mrs. Camonte: He hurt you. He hurt you. He hurt everybody.
Poppy: Kind of gaudy, isn`t it?
Tony Camonte: Ain`t it though? Glad you like it.
Title Card: [opening message] 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. Every incident in this picture is the reproduction of an actual occurrence, and the purpose of this picture is to demand of the government: `What are you going to do about it?` The government is your government. What are YOU going to do about it?
Tony Camonte: Nice little thug. He give `em a writ of hocus pocus.
Tony Camonte: There`s only one thing that gets orders and gives orders.
[points to Tommy Gun]
Tony Camonte: And this is it. That`s how I got the south side for you, and that`s how I`m gonna get the north side for you. It`s a typewriter. I`m gonna write my name all over this town with it, in big letters!
John `Johnny` Lovo: Hey, stop him somebody!
Tony Camonte: Get out of my way Johnny, I`m gonna spit!
[starts firing]
Tony Camonte: This fellow`s got ideas I don`t like.
[Angelo is answering the phone for Tony]
Tony Camonte: Hey, hey. Get a name. Get a name.
Angelo: [speaking into telephone] What`s your name? No, no, I no wanna know what`s your brother`s name, I wanna know what`s your name.
[angrily]
Angelo: Oh, you do, huh? Listen, I come on over there, I smack you right in the teeth! I get you, you brother -
Tony Camonte: Hey! What`s the matter? That`s no way to talk. Talk nice. Tell him to state his business.
Angelo: Go state your business!
[hangs up phone]
Insp. Ben Guarino: I told you you`d show up this way. Get you in a jam without a gun and you squeal like a yellow rat. Come on, climb into this
[handcuffs]
Tony Camonte: Listen, Little Boy, in this business there`s only one law you gotta follow to keep out of trouble: Do it first, do it yourself, and keep on doing it.
Trivia
Al Capone was rumored to have liked the film so much that he had his own copy of it.
George Raft didn`t have to go far for inspiration on how to play a gangster in this film. He grew up in a New York City slum alongside gangsters `Bugsy Siegel` (qva), Meyer Lansky, Joe Adonis and Lucky Luciano. In an ironic twist, after the release of "Scarface", many of Raft`s gangster pals would come to him for advice on how to dress, walk, talk, etc.
Many of the events in the film are based upon the life of Al Capone and the Chicago gang wars of the 1920s. In order, the most prominent are: 1. Tony`s killing of his boss, "Big Louie" Costillo, in the lobby of his club is based on Capone`s involvement in the murder of his first boss, "Big" Jim Colosimo. 2. Guino (George Raft) comes into Tony`s apartment wearing a flower in his coat lapel and we learn he killed rival boss, O`Hara. In real life, Capone`s men killed Charles Dion O`Bannion in his flower shop. 3. The scene where Gaffney (Boris Karloff) leads a caravan of cars in a drive-by shooting at Tony in a restaurant was based on an incident in 1927 when Capone`s rival, Hymie Weiss, did the same thing to him. 4. When Johnny Lovo tries to get Tony killed in a car chase. That comes from the demise of Capone`s allies, the Genna Brothers. 5. The St. Valentine`s Day Massacre of 1929.
Prominent use of the figure "X". Its first appearance is under the opening credits and from then on, whenever a character dies, the figure "X" is prominent in the scene. Some examples: during the shooting in the bowling alley, a pencil fills in a strike box on a scorecard. When a recreation of the St. Valentine`s Massacre is shown, the scene begins in the rafters of the garage, where the roof support beams are seven "X" shaped pieces. When Tony kills his best friend at the door of his apartment, the number on the door is "X". This was done for a reason: newspapers at the time printed photos of crime scenes. The "X" would be used to mark the spot of where the body was found.
Ranked #6 on the American Film Institute`s list of the 10 greatest films in the genre "Gangster". The remake Scarface (1983), starring Al Pacino, is ranked #10 in June 2008.
Screenwriter Ben Hecht was a former Chicago journalist familiar with the city`s Prohibition-era gangsters, including Al Capone. During the filming Hecht returned to his Los Angeles hotel room one night to find two Capone torpedoes waiting for him. The gangsters demanded to know if the movie was about Capone. Hecht assured them it wasn`t, saying that the character Tony Camonte was based on gangsters like "Big" Jim Colosimo and Charles Dion O`Bannion. "Then why is the movie called Scarface?" one of the hoods demanded. "Everyone will think it`s about Capone!" "That`s the reason," said Hecht. "If you call the movie `Scarface`, people will think it`s about Capone and come to see it. It`s part of the racket we call show business." The Capone hoods, who appreciated the value of a scam, left the hotel placated.
The "serious" play in which Tony is so interested is an adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham`s "Sadie Thompson".
The censors of the time thought that the film depicted that a life of crime was too easy and that Tony had still gotten away with his crimes. A second ending was shot, showing Tony being taken away by the police. He is then tried, found guilty and hanged. Paul Muni is not seen throughout this ending. Tony`s sister`s death scene was also re-edited, as it was felt that his affections toward her were not so brotherly. None of these changes satisfied the censors, so director Howard Hawks decided to abandon the changes and released it without censor approval. The movie`s subtitle, "(The) Shame of a Nation", was added to deflect criticism on the same grounds.
The sign outside Camonte`s apartment says "The World Is Yours". That was also prominently used in this film`s 1983 remake.
This is one of the first films to feature the Thompson submachine gun, known to history as the "tommy gun." The characters never call it anything other than "machine gun," except when Poppy calls it a "bean shooter" and Tommy refers to the gun as a "typewriter" when he first sees one. Another name for a "tommy gun" was "Chicago typewriter
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