What most of the general public doesn't know is that Brian De Palma's
Scarface in 1983 that starred Al Pacino was in fact a remake. Oh, really? Yes, Really! Oliver Stone was the screenwriter at the time and he had the duty of remaking the 1932 version, that was co-directed by Howard Hawkes.
Next question that is sure to 'Hey why is this on comicbookmovie.com?' Well as another fun fact the publishing company IDW saw a chance to bank some dough with a comic book about Tony Montana and created limited series called
Scarface: Scarred For Life. It follows a what if scenario of what would've happened to Tony Montana if he had survived the final shootout that Al Pacino in the film version did not.
Excerpt from Deadline article
Training Day scribe David Ayer has been hired to write the new version of Scarface for Universal Pictures. The film will put a contemporary spin on the outlaw tale first released in 1932 with Paul Muni playing an Italian who took over Chicago, and then turned into the spectacularly violent 1983 film that starred Al Pacino as Tony Montana, a Cuban who took over the cocaine trade in 1980s Miami.
The new film is being produced by Marc Shmuger and his Global Produce banner along with Martin Bregman, who produced the Brian De Palma-directed version. When the studio set up the project in late September, the intention wasn’t to do a remake as much as to marry the common elements of the two films with a contemporary crime context. Basically, the focus is on an outsider, an immigrant who barges his way into the criminal establishment in pursuit of a twisted version of the American dream, becoming a kingpin through a campaign of ruthlessness and violent ambition.
David Ayer:“This is a fantasy for me, I can still remember when I saw the film at 13 and it blew my mind. I sought it out; I went after it hard. I see it as the story of the American dream, with a character whose moral compass points in a different direction. That puts it right in my wheelhouse."
"I studied both the original Ben Hecht-Howard Hawks movie and the DePalma-Pacino version and found some universal themes. I’m still under the hood figuring out the wiring that will translate, but both films had a specificity of place, there was unapologetic violence, and a main character who socially scared the shit out of people, but who had his own moral code. Each was faithful to the underworld of its time. There are enough opportunities in the real world today that provide an opportunity to do this right. If it was just an attempt to remake the 1983 film, that would never work.”