Scarface

I didn't realize how much of what I have been saying was Scarface. I'm starting to think that if I had seen this movie before there would have been little room in my heart for New Jack City.

Like a number of icons of American popular culture, Scarface is one of those films that I've only seen glimpses of. Or perhaps I had digested it so long ago without having refreshed my memory that I've been hearing echoes of its truth without giving it props. Instead, I just watched it yesterday and today and I keep saying - Oh, I thought Flavor Flav invented that, and Oh, I thought Nas invented that.

"Say hello to my little friend." OK everybody knows that was Pacino is Scarface, but I didn't know "Who do I trust? Me!" was Pacino in Scarface. There seem to be eight or nine scenes from this film that have been copied in a dozen other films since. One in particular I remember is the - cruising the car in the evening with an oil refinery in the background to a small humble house on the edge of town. Set It Off did that. Fracture did that. I'm sure it was also done in Deep Cover and in One False Move as well. The quote page on IMDB is huge. Anyway...

Now I know.