‘One of my best scripts’: When Suicide Squad director tackled Scarface remake

Fighting Tony Montana isn’t always a “dream life”! A remake of Scarface with Al Pacino (itself a remake of the 1933 film) is on hold for the time being. But in 2017, David Ayer (Suicide Squad) was hired to direct the project, which he chose to rewrite in his own way.

A few months later we officially learned that he had abandoned ship to shoot the fantasy thriller Bright for Netflix with Will Smith! But the reality is ultimately quite different.

They asked about the discontinued project The whole movieThe Fury director shared his passion for what he wrote around the character of Tony Montana:

One of my best scripts was my version of Scarface. He has passed through quite a few hands in Hollywood. And it’s funny when people talk about the project. ‘Is this Ayer’s script?’, ‘No, it’s someone else’s’, ‘Ah, good.’.

Ayer refers to the fact that after his departure, Universal entrusted the remake with a script reworked by Luca Guadagnino, Ethan and Joel Coen. Since then, the director of Call Me By Your Name has also slammed the door and the project has been blocked for now.

But did David Ayer write a movie that was too violent? Because that’s what got him into trouble at Warner on Suicide Squad, which the studio deemed too dark, then ordered it edited and shot without the director’s approval.

“It wasn’t very violent. Violence, I know how to hide it. Or if someone gets shot, I can shoot it with an exploding head and get an R rating and it’s not going to alienate anyone. It’s easy, that’s the basis. About the director’s work.

An honest explanation with the studio

“I created this rich and moving trajectory that explored the drug trade and what it really is.”Iyer confides. “The studio just wanted something more fun.” First of all, Universal wanted a blockbuster that could get receivers in all countries of the world, an international success:

They wanted to reach as wide an audience as possible. Damn, I love Universal, they are incredible people. I had a very honest conversation with them about the film that they wanted and that I wanted to make. We had so many disagreements, it was easier to just say, “We forget.”

David Ayer has a tendency to be talked about almost more for the projects he’s canceled (Scarface) or the projects he’s been fired from (Suicide Squad) than for his ongoing work. He released his latest film, The Tax Collector, starring Shia LaBeouf, relatively indifferently.

Let’s wish him the best of luck in his next feature film, The Beekeeper with Jason Statham, which still has no release date in France.