STORY. Ace Atkins - Masque Publishing - 2011 - 458 pages.
San Francisco, 1921. Full prohibition, Roscoe Arbuckle, the silent comedy star, is accused of having at a party in his suite unbridled the Hotel St. Francis, "crushed" a young actress, causing his death. Samuel Hammett - Dashiell when he became a writer - is mandated by the Pinkerton agency that employs him, to examine witnesses of the trial the most scandalous in the history of cinema: the press Randolph Hearst overwhelms Roscoe, who has protested his innocence . Hammett, decreasing ued by the tube rculose who eats, drinking too much and smoking one cigarette, will one day set-up, while pursuing bootleggers with a pretty blond FBI agent.
"The case is the Arbuckle case the funniest I've attended. Trying de le condamner, tout le monde à piégé tout le monde". Dashiell Hammett - New York Herald Tribune, 1933.
"Le public américain adore ses héros, mais lorsqu'il s'agit de les détruire, il se montre aus si excessif. Il élève un homme plus rapidement qu'aucune nation au monde, et l'abat plus vite encore". Roscoe Arbuckle, 1922.
"Le jardin du di
able" est une histoire passionnante à lire! et le jeune auteur américain Ace Atkins, se révèle être un formidable conteur, doté d'une plume aussi affûtée et ciselée que son aîné James Ellroy. At a time when silent films still stammers, Roscoe Arbukle said Fatty, is a fantastic actor and film comedy, as famous if not more, than I Charl Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd combined.
reached the peak of its glory, Fatty tumbles and dives into the void, in what would become the first real Hollywood scandal: the case of Virginia Rappe.
rope in a dark sex scandal, after a night watered in a San Francisco hotel, poor Fatty Arbuckle is seen pasted the death of a drug addict, found steep fucked in the toilet in his on. And the plummeting of the famous comic, will inaugurate a long list of artists, victims of their image and their environment.
Knowing at the outset, this case in "broad terms", I threw myself on the book by Ace Atkins when it was released in bookstores, as "an octopus on his prey."
Mecca of cinema during the silent era already swarming with young beginners in need of star system, haunting the studios around, looking for a producer, a director or at worst an extra in Hollywood productions to come.
Alcohol, drugs, sex: a trademark is well known! with as main character in the role of private detective, Dashiell Hammett himself.
The Arbuckle case could have stopped there! But soon the rumor of a "orgy" that might have slipped, with rape by blunt object. Therefore, a macabre scenario sets off a trap, an ambush whispers among the population where everyone likes to imagine the big Fatty in postures most scabrous.
The scandal is now ripe to burst into the open!
Besides the two main characters, "people" also known as Marion Davies, Charlie Chaplin and Howard Hughes animate this fresco black hectic and the "Roaring Twenties". "The Devil's Garden" is also a brilliant evocation of the depraved mores of the time, the obsession with fame and money, corruption of judges and the impunity of the rich: the American rotten side prompted Hammett to write later "Red Harvest" and "The Glass Key."
In reading "Devil's Garden", the reader quickly find the images that made the fame of the California sun, swimming pools, beautiful girls and handsome boys. As everyone knows, Los Angeles is the symbol of the American dream - but that city exists only in the commercials. For in this novel, from a true story, behind the scenes is more like a smelly swamp full of sex and corruption, like a William Randolph Hearst, who built a vast empire in the media (press , radio). And as with the model of "Citizen Kane" by Orson Welles get drunk garbage and slander, by itself symbolizes the moral decay that seems to have reached all the Hollywood film industry of those years. Finally, the novel shows clearly, the growing influence of the Puritan community of the time, opportunity for them to denounce Babylon where this new money, lust and alcohol flowing like water. And where a certain Will Hayes, will benefit from establishing a rigorous moral code on the screen, which bears his name and will reign for many years, the terror in Hollywood, seeing in it: the devil's garden. But viewers have seen others since ...
Certainly my first big crush of the year. Read them! 9 / 10.
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