One Sentence Movie Reviews: “Scarface: Shame of the Nation”
Scarface: Shame of the Nation (1932): "Er, eh, crime doesn’t pay, unless you’re Paul Muni tearin’ the business up in a performance that makes Tony Montana look like a soggy-diapered infant."
Notes: Considered the first crime film of its kind (taciturn cops, dangerous women, loving mothers and fedoras on everything with a head) and weighed down by a bunch of dated "crime doesn’t pay" moralizing (the movie actually begins with a shrill title card announcing that what follows is an indictment of bootlegging and shooting people. As if you didn’t know). Moves along just fine but really only with seeing for Paul Muni (who managed to play Al Capone, Emile Zola and a Chinese slave within 5 years of each other) and in an ongoing attempt to see the entirety of the AFI 400.
The mission continues.