Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon by Kenneth Anger (1975-08-01)

The book came in slightly damaged condition (only the paper covering of this hardcover) however none of that is really an issue for me.
The content within was basically a cliff note version of the predillictions and demis of many of hollywood actor/actress from the golden era. The photos make up the majorityt of this book which makes reading it much more exciting and interesting when you can put a face to the story behind the rise and fall of the subject in question.

The ship time is a bit long when ordering from this vendor (almost 3 weeks).
Other than that I a totally happy with my purchase order and am enjoying this rare find. Thank you

Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon books are not factual and they are still often maligned by movie historians for their inaccuracies. These books also amplify (for better and worse) a lot of urban legends. But despite all of this, Anger's Hollywood Babylon books are an invaluable compilation of industry gossip that is as entertaining and amusing as they are trashy. HB was never meant to be taken serious. The photos alone are worth the purchase and Volume 2 is consistent with Vol. 1. A guilty pleasure for sure. Just don't quote any stories as fact without digging deeper for the real story.

Hollywood Babylon is not factual. The book amplifies (for better and worse) a lot of urban legends. But despite all of this, Kenneth Anger's cult classic is an invaluable compilation of industry gossip that is both entertaining and trashy. It was never meant to be taken serious. The photos alone are worth the purchase. A guilty pleasure.

After attaining success in an industry that has nothing to do with "the Industry" (obnoxious local term)and living in Hollywood for about 9 years, I'm more skeptical of people who think something's false because it's 'contradicted' in some autobiography than I am of stories that might suffer from a couple "first reports" inaccuracies.

While I probably know less about pop culture than most foreigners, I can say from experience that Hollywood really is at least as disgusting as the worst, most inaccurate tabloids, and 3am 'personals' posts on Craigslist. Now that I've made my money (again, totally unrelated industry) and am able to move out of state, I would be okay if LA (especially Hollywood) were nuked. Hell, I'd be okay with it being nuked before I have a chance to leave, if the alternative were that it might not happen.

Almost everyone here is either a trustifarian, a prostitute or a barrista, but calling themselves an actor or writer. I personally know one of the rent-boys (who looks like he's 12) for G@ry Godd@rd and Bri@n @nsier (the two of the Infamous Three, who hunt for run-aways at McDonald's all over town) who attends their (largely) under-age orgies (and brokers children). I also have a friend who's been to the same events (at the house of the third of the Infamous Three, where the really under-age stuff happens), and who was held captive in a warehouse for weeks (with other prospective pop musicians), and was basically psychologically tortured and drugged while they decided if he was going to be the next pop-singing sensation. And all of this is in addition to all of the craziness of the double-lives of mega-rich Saudis who visit perennially (and seem to have diplomatic immunity and s*** gold), "bug-chasers" wilfully giving and receiving HIV, Scientologists, with their creepy uniforms and blue paint, who practically wallpaper every square inch of public space with their free "writing/acting workshops", "free personality tests", etc flyers. I've even met two Nazi war-criminals (one, a retired Operation Paperclip rocket-scientist who was obsessively protective over his vaulted closet, and another, a former SS officer, complete with the original outfit by Dior). The s*** I can't unsee or unhear that I wish weren't real... And unfortunately, I've observed these types of things where I know it's not conjecture or gossip, and weren't people just creating bigger-than-life personalities and back-stories (which is almost a resume requirement of all of the who-do-you's running around this ugly dump).

It's a very strange, soul-crushing town, where I regularly talk to or see celebrities on the streets, or in bars, without even realizing it, and meet billionaires from around the world. I usually don't know this happens until a friend or a stranger whispers, "oh my god, that's so-and-so". But like I said, if you're going to nuke it, don't wait for me to make it out if it means it might not get done - just get it done.

Anger's biographer Bill Landis says this book was written in great haste, and I'm inclined to agree. It consists of shallow, badly-written anecdotes that wouldn't be good enough for the Weekly World News. There's a set of photos of Liz Taylor in her "fat" stage with no accompanying story, and that's a waste. The best part of the book is the one about Alex Pantages, who most readers have probably never heard of, so for that I'm greatful. But the rest is nothing but lists of actors who died from drugs. Anger could've written a great article on John Landis, and how he got two children killed while making the Twilight Zone movie, or Heaven's Gate, the most expensive flop of all time. But instead he just throws stories together.

Lighten up Kenneth. Your bitterness ruins the book. If you really want to write a bestseller, why not track down and interview the ex-stars? And why not write about what you've been doing for the last 30 years?

Definitely not as good as the first Hollywood Babylon--I've had this book for several months and still haven't been able to get entirely through it; a lot of repetition from the first HB, and as far as the new information presented, it's only a few paragraphs at times. Definitely a disappointment from the first one.

Hollywood Babylon contains inaccurate information. I believe the modern version is supposed to be more accurate than the original version, which I have never seen. Nonetheless, many people now accept what it says as fact. Actually, much of it seems to have come from gossip originally. There are some details in the book that I know are false, others that I think are distorted, some that I do not know anything about. There are also some things in the book that are true. But it is like they say, don't believe everything you read. The first time I read this book, a number of years ago, I wrote to the publisher and pointed out that there were some inaccuracies in it, but since they are m aking money out of it, they don't really care about it. I also remember one writer complained about what Hollywood Babylon said about Fatty Arbuckls supposedly being at an orgy in Massachusetts, which he evidentally wasn't really at. But mostly what I noticed Anger was wrong about was in the chapter about Thelma Todd. He says she was living in the house with the garage attached to it with Roland West, when actually she was living above the restaraunt. Roland West also lived up above the Restaraunt, but in a separate apartment. There has been some controversary about their living arrangements, so I won't go into that here, except to say that Anger's statement that Thelma Todd was West's "mistress" would have been denied by Roland West himself. Hollywood Babylong contains other erroneous information about Thelma Todd. For one thing, it says she was buried in Forrest Lawn cemetary. Actually she was cremated and her mother took her ashes back to to Massachusets, where they were later buried with the mother after her death. I once wrote to Hal Roach, the producer, and the former boss of Thelma Todd, and asked him about Anger's story that Roach dissuaded Thelma Todd's lawyer from starting another inquest. This story seems doubtful to me, but unfortunately Mr. Roach declined to comment

This book is an absolutely riveting and bizarre journey into the dark underworld of Hollywood, jam-packed with salacious gossip, startling stories, and incredible, often weird photographs. It is every bit as tawdry and interesting as the original "Hollywood Babylon," if not more so.

The sniffy reviewer who thinks it is "boring" is either jealous, or was in a particularly sour snit when he trashed this masterpiece. Do yourself a favor. Get this treasure and judge for yourself.

What makes Anger's volumes one-of-a-kind are that among the well-known scandals and horror stories, he draws you into the fringes and strange by-ways of old Hollywood, dredging up offbeat tales - big stories at the time, but now long-forgotten - of people you won't read about elsewhere; the suave character actor with a taste for orgies, the gay decorator and his pals who were beaten up on the beach by a mob of rednecks, the world-famous tennis player who lived in Hollywood and had a taste for young boys. This was perhaps the first book to have the actual, grisly crime-scene photos of the Black Dahlia. Many pages are devoted to detailed descriptions of suicides, many of them people you've never heard of, but won't forget.

Yes, there are indeed sad photos of movie people of the 20's through the 70's, drunk, grossly overweight, in the throes of drug addiction, in jail, in fights, being arrested,lying in coffins.

If you have an appreciation for the odd and unusual, and are interested in a very different look at the glory days of Hollywood, you simply must have this book.

This is the granddaddy of books dealing with Hollywood's dark side.

Drawing as much from gossip as he does from known facts, author Kenneth Anger dishes all the "inside dope" about the glamourous stars of Hollywood's Golden Age.

From the Fatty Arbuckle murder trial to the Lana Turner/Johnny Stompanato affair, no scandal is left out of this book that continually pushes the envelope to the very edge and, possibly, over it.

For example, there's one drawing in the book of Cary Grant (circa 1930s) that bears the caption, "Who's a fairy?"

There are also some very unflattering photos of stars without clothes or make-up, being arrested and even dead.

If you are looking for something "in good taste," this book is definitely not for you.

On the other hand, if you're looking for an entertaining diversion, then HOLLYWOOD BABYLON might just be it. Just don't believe everything you read.

© Michael B. Druxman

Anybody who is considering buying this book (and its sequel, if one can find it) should know that it has absolutely no pretensions of being fair or accurate. Despite the wild inaccuracies of now-deceased stars' exploits, the book is still like seeing a car wreck: you know it's awful, but you can't resist looking at it. It's a fun book in spite of itself.
The photos are often tasteless, the prose is often tacky and sleazy, the research is put together with two nails and a hammer, and overall the book reminds one of the old "Confidential" magazines (the magazine is actually profiled in one of the book's chapters). Yet sleaze and tackiness are what Hollywood was all about, so the book seems fitting.
If you want accuracy in a book, go elsewhere. If you like gossip in the most vicious and slimy way possible, then this is your book.

Hollywood is a place i have always dreamed about and have NEVER wanted to visit, and this book only solidifies my conviction.
what's great about it is that all of our present day sandals-- OJ, Michael Jackson, J-Lo, the list goes on-- seem like small potatoes compared to the movers and shakers of the Golden Age of Cinema. Drug overdoeses, sex, violence, police corruption, and hintings of the underworld ran rampant and Anger's prose in the style of a tabloid is so engaging i couldn't put this book down!
and i'm not ashamed to admit that the pictures (which were helpful in stories regarding actors i had never heard of before) add to the narrative in surreal and funny ways *** check out the picture of Jayne Mansfield's dead dog at the end!
a fun and quick read for the summer!

What saves the sensationalistic - not to say trashy and in many places inaccurate - _Hollywood Babylon_ from being a total failure is the huge number of pictures, many shocking and some downright grisly (as in the picture of poor Thelma Todd lying done to death in her car), but mostly fascinating if sometimes nauseating (I'll talk about one of the worst offenders shortly). Which is a good thing, because frankly I want to take a bath every time I read the text to wash off the grime. We all know that Hollywood in its "Golden Age" was a long way removed from the image of saintly morality painted by its self-appointed guardians, the studio moguls - very many of whom had guilty secrets among them - chief among them, but Kenneth Anger seems to take a little too much delight in the sordidity and scandal for my own taste. What makes it worse is that he passes on a number of urban legends rather than do the boring work of get at the truth.

One of the most objectionable myths he fosters in this book, in my view, is the story that Jayne Mansfield was decapitated in the auto accident that took her life in 1967. This is simply not true. There is a ghastly photo in circulation on the web - I won't link to it but those who really want to know can Google for it - that makes it clear that her injuries, while fatal, did not result in the removal of her head. What you see on the car's crumpled hood in that photo (that Anger claims was Mansfield's noggin) is actually her wig. (And did we really need to see that photo of her dead Chihuahua? Ugh.)

If people want a really good book on Hollywood scandals, I strongly suggest they go find James Robert Parish's well-researched, evenhanded, brightly-written _The Hollywood Book of Scandal_ instead. (And that book doesn't contain any photos likely to make you lose your lunch, either!)

Hollwood Babylon is still a good, juicy read. Which is good because everything in it is from the "good ole days" of Hollwood and you shouldn't think much of anything has happened in the gutter out there since around 1965. First published in the early 70's, the material this book covers was already mostly old stuff and the draw was nobody knew much about it. Then, finally, it was all there. Fatty's deathly fling? Read on. Suicide? This books got em, along with plenty of unsolved murders and Thelma Todd. If you like your scandals 20's and 30's style, this books for you.

A long, long time ago I arrived in Hollywood, anxious to be an actor in television. It turned out I wasn't very good, I went into the Navy and moved on with my life. But I bought this rather scandalous tome because, quite honestly, I kept seeing it in people's homes and I wanted my own copy. Gas was cheap back in the 70s and we would drive around checking out addresses if we could find them.
Even in those days I knew there were some errors in the book but I referred to it, nonetheless, as my Bible of TRUE Hollywood scandal.
After my stint for Uncle Sam I began a much tamer career and developed a penchant for history and TRUTH. It was then I discovered this book is a giant fraud. It contains almost no truth whatsoever. It is merely a collection of old myths, most debunked before Kenneth Anger ever heard them.
Then I began to wonder: why would a man write such obvious crap? I think I gradually learned the answer over the years. Kenneth Anger claims he was a child actor yet Hollywood historians refute this claim. The only films Anger was ever in were the short subject films he created, none of which was ever held in high regard. In other words, he was a rejected actor, too. I believe I can understand his frustration at being turned away. It can be hard on one's ego to try & try and get nothing in return. But I knew going in I wasn't that good so rejection wasn't a huge deal. But I think it may have been for Kenneth.
After years of rejection little Kenneth Anger found a way to get even with them all - he'd write trash stories as if they were really factual and sell them. Sell they did, this book has been around for umpteen years through printing after printing and little Kenneth is still getting his Hollywood payday.
Please don't believe this book. Nowadays Wickipedia allows us to check "facts" too easily. Don't be fooled by this trash posing as the "inside story".
Kenneth Anger was never an insider and these stories are demonstrably false.

This dated book still serves as an entertaining and somewhat historical account of the seedy behavior of movie stars past. It's hard to determine just where the facts stopped and the sensationalized gossip starts, but for the most part alot of the information can be verified by research. Plain dull facts do not sell books so Anger cannot be blamed for adding some spice to these stories. This is actually a good study of human nature and how a privileged few behave when they hit the big time, then react when the inevidible fadeaway comes. Many parallels can be found in sports and the music industry where sudden fame and wealth changes people. People will always be fascinated with the lifestyles of their heroes and idols. Anger does a good job of dishing up the aspects these idols don't want their adoring public to know.

While many perceive Kenneth Anger as a unlikable, bitter, iconoclast who else could have captured the subject of Hollywood's dark side with such stamina and dark jest.
This book for me makes any star gazer see the real side of fame, fortune, and power.
Supposedly Anger and others were trying to make Hollywood Baby into a movie. I do hope that someday it does get done. Just the thought of the "Business" and it's dark side depicted on celluloid would be like one looking in a mirror and realzing that you are real and fallable.
I urge all to enjoy this book for what it is. A complete and candid version of some of Hollywood's greatest in some of their most darkest hours when the cameras weren't rolling. It also reveals how the studios would protect their commodities at all costs.

Hollywood Babylon is like the movie, "Alive," in that it was great, but so sickening, you're not sure whether or not you want to recommend it to anyone. If you're of the faint of heart and want to hold onto cherished memories of the Golden Age of Hollywood, don't read it at all; you will be grossed out completely and may even lose your mind from the depravity. If you're of a stronger constitution, you may like it, but be prepared for grisly photos of dead people, revolting scandals and disgusting incidents. But if you're just a sick puppy, this book's for you! I, for one, am not one, so I gave it three stars. I would've given it four, but I had to deduct a point for the Tackyness Factor (c'mon--did we really need to see a picture of Jayne Mansfield's mangled dead dog after her fatal car crash? Yeeesh!). At any rate, buy this book if you like, but remember--you've been warned!

Kenneth Anger's hollywood babylon is the kind of book you can pick up and put down at any time.. I find it interesting to page through before or after I watch one of the older movies of hollywood's golden age.. I can't get enough of this sort of look into the dumpster of tinseltown.. the scandals and episodes that have been brushed under the carpet or just are no longer known about.. The list of characters that populate these pages are as colorful as they were glamorous.. and also at times hideous..
This is not very heavy reading but it is endlessly fascinating..

Perhaps the worst book ever written. In fact, it wasn't even allowed to be published in the U.S., until many years after it's release in France. Anger did no research. He basically wrote whatever he wanted. Not recommended. One star only because the store does not have a 1/4 star rating.

The stars whose jangled nerves led to private mental homes, such as Clara Bow and Buster Keaton, made less noise in falling than those who wrote their own way out.

--Kenneth Anger, Hollywood Babylon

"Mental illness exists in writers. David Foster Wallace killed himself.

What is this desire to be outside of your own head? What is this need to express? Are you a liar too?

In 2006 after a decade of drug and alcohol abuse I walked into my roommates bedroom in our Brooklyn apartment and calmly announced that I had been hacking at my arm with a watermelon knife. Sitting on my bed, repeating the words "I can't trust you!" the knife coming toward my exposed wrist at full speed. Then there was a moment, which I will for lack of a better word describe as "clarity." If anything it was a crack, a small glimmer of rationality in the middle of an insane act. I set down the knife, realized that I was being dramatic--I don't use that word here flippantly--and tried as best as I could to assess the situation and put myself in the hands of someone more capable, to surrender: to confess. I walked down the hallway, gently pushed open Heather's door and her big blue eyes looked up from her graduate master's of social work homework.

By the end of that year, I had finished a stint in a posh Pennsylvania rehab, been diagnosed as bi-polar, attended weekly, out-patient therapy, was swallowing a daily cocktail of Depakote, Lithium, and Ambian while working my way through the Twelve Steps and Traditions. Slowly things began to settle into a hum of consistency, a low-frequency drone that was neither painful nor mild, but rather, regular, and aware always that is was being motorized by an almost silent whir.

I was 26."

....

Read Nikki Darling's full review of "Hollywood Babylon" here: [...]

This book is an accumulation of nothing but gossip information. That's all it purports to be. However, we are treated to photographs which sometimes back up and other times go off subject of some of the scandals. There's some nudity and certainly other scandalous data, so it probably isn't for the kiddies.
Don't believe every word between this book's covers as the author isn't a historian - he's more of a fey Hedda Hopper.
Regardless, the book is fun and laughable and shocking.

This book is full of very interesting truths, and if you can't handle it, then you'd better keep reading the tabloids or just good old Jane Austin. This book is good, but it has some teases, meaning it will show you a picture but not always explain the circumstances and it almost never gives addresses (to those of you who like to scout out the place). The 2nd book is MUCH better! I would actually reccommend that one first and if you loved THAT then get this one. Hollywood Babylon 2!

The original Hollywood Babylon was basically Kenneth Anger slandering a bunch of long dead people. It contained nothing but sensationalistic stories and photos...and not a dang thing was accurate in it! Hollywood Babylon 2 manages to be just SLIGHTLY less wrong...but its a mess and worthless none the less. Google Debunking Hollywood Babylon you'll see what I mean.

This book is a very messy layout, with certain things just running into other stories. Anger even manages to contradict himself just chapters later (Gloria Swanson and Joe Kennedy would be one example) and the grand finale of the book is basically a fireworks worth of celeb suicides, murders, and accidental deaths. Literally 10-20 or so a page just 'so and so did this and killed themselves this way'. I literally went bit by bit to see if any of this was accurate and maybe 20% of the finale was. Good for Anger, but very bad for anyone who takes this junk as fact.

Anger cant get dates right to save his life, and sometimes he gets names and events wrong. He's bad with ages as well (probably because of his date problem). One of the worst examples in this book is what he did to Karl Dane...thankfully 20 some years later someone decided to right that wrong.

Honestly as deliciously bad as some people find the first Hollywood (I wonder how dirty they feel?) this one is just boring in its barely ever accuracy.

If your curious do the googling and buy a penny copy of this book and see what I mean...then burn it when your done with it. Hopefully when Anger dies (shouldnt be long now hes in his 80s I believe) karma will get him.

Like any newspaper article, events are turned into "stories." These "stories", like any silver screen biography, tells the dramatic tale of a life in turmoil. Kenneth Anger's book, "Hollywood Babylon" takes the angle of a tabloid and digs up some old dirt of famous celebrity lives and puts it into a full collection of grime, grease and oil. This collection takes a chronological look at Hollywood's finest at the time beginning in the early twenties with such big names as Fatty Arbuckle whose drinking problem got out of hand at one of his big parties after signing a lucrative deal. Moving through time to the 30's, 40's, right up to the Sharon Tate murder, which Anger recognized it was no longer "Old Hollywood."
The book reads like a gossip column mixed with sleazy tabloid journalism, yet with the wit and humor of a prankster. It's an exploitation of exploited lives. To mimic tabloids further, the pages appear with large and sometimes disturbing photos of stars at their most inopportune moments.
While much of the material has already had its heyday in newspapers of the times, it has a new life today where many of these actors and actresses are virtually unheard of by the general public and rekindled new interest in their films. Just as watching and old O. J. Simpson football game may have the same appeal as watching Lana Turner in her debut "They Won't Forget."
The title to me is entirely fitting, as Hollywood is the "Babylon" of our society, one in which everyone has all their wants at their disposal. A place where hedonism is the religion and tragedy is only the end of a scene, for we know by the end of the movie everything will be all right. My only disappointment in the book is its cursory glance at such stars as Marylyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield and many other stars that became almost a tally only to be put under a heading of how they died. "Hollywood Babylon" still fits the bill, however, as an enticing and racy read of the darker seedy side of that strange and secret society.

Perez Hilton's precursor - early Hollywood scandal proving that the more things change the more they stay the same.

This is full of pictures & of reminders of the Hollywood that used to be which really isn't that different than the Hollywood that is today - except that the studios took a bit more care of their stars back in the day.

Witty, sly, & salacious - this is very fun.

Looks like a lot of people have gotten worked into a lather around here over this book. Lighten up folks! This isn't meant to be some serious anthropological study of Hollywood and its denizens. Anger's just dishin' up the dirt and gettin' down with the sleazemongers. A few little anecdotes about Fatty, Frances, Lupe, et. al are all that's offered up here. I don't believe it's even meant in a particularly mean-spirited way. It reads more like black comedy to me.

Hollywood Babylon is a definate must read for anyone interested in Hollywood history. I doubt if everything in the book is accurate. It reads like a tabloid. But all the rumours and gossip that surround the history of Hollywood are there, and it makes for interesting reading. Alot of what is written in the book is sad and disturbing. It tells the story of the bad side of Hollywood. Worth reading if you want to know all sides of the story about Hollywood.

As captivated as I was by the first Hollywood Babylon ,part 2 is even better! Packed with more photos and Angers cunning (and cutting)campy wit it brings "old hollywood" to its knees (no pun intended!).A wonderful look at the behind the scenes Hollywood of the past its a great read .I cant wait for 20+ years from now somebody,somewhere does a part 3 and brings us up to date about whats STILL must going on behind the scenes.This book works for truecrime fans,hollywood/movie buffs or anybody who reads tabloids in the checkout line when they think no ones looking!!!! A fun,campy thrill ride of fun!!!!!

Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon is a legendary piece of writing. But just like Bret Easton Ellis's novels, it is not for everyone. Some people prefer walks in the country, Jane Austen and Kenny G records, Some of us want to go a step further.
Anger didn't save any gunpowder when firing away at everything that's wrong with Hollywood today, and one can trace a great sense of bitterness in between the lines of the novel. The novel is really a "You'll never eat lunch in this town again" for men. Like a'n X-rated movie, it doesn't cut away the gory parts, it doesn't hesitate to explore and exploit. Like life, it doesn't glorify and Anger certainly isn't out to seduce his reader. It is a stunning insight into the filthy and corrupted world that is Hollywood. If you want to make it in Hollywood and you don't want to change your mind, go read Premiere magazine! If you wanna know what you're headed for, read Hollywood Babylon. A masterpiece!

Magnus Lindkvis

Babylon makes for an interesting and quick read, but the pictures are what really make this book. It's loaded with pictures throughout of the murders, affairs, drug busts that pull us in to old Hollywood. The book focuses mostly on the Hollywood of the 20s-40s -- perhaps because that's when most of the excitement took place. My main complaint would be that the author often uses elaborate superfluous language to describe the events-- almost like a sensationalist tabloid from that time.

As captivated as I was by the first Hollywood Babylon ,part 2 is even better! Packed with more photos and Angers cunning (and cutting)campy wit it brings "old hollywood" to its knees (no pun intended!).A wonderful look at the behind the scenes Hollywood of the past its a great read .I cant wait for 20+ years from now somebody,somewhere does a part 3 and brings us up to date about whats STILL must going on behind the scenes.This book works for truecrime fans,hollywood/movie buffs or anybody who reads tabloids in the checkout line when they think no ones looking!!!! A fun,campy thrill ride of fun!!!!!

Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon is a legendary piece of writing. But just like Bret Easton Ellis's novels, it is not for everyone. Some people prefer walks in the country, Jane Austen and Kenny G records, Some of us want to go a step further.
Anger didn't save any gunpowder when firing away at everything that's wrong with Hollywood today, and one can trace a great sense of bitterness in between the lines of the novel. The novel is really a "You'll never eat lunch in this town again" for men. Like a'n X-rated movie, it doesn't cut away the gory parts, it doesn't hesitate to explore and exploit. Like life, it doesn't glorify and Anger certainly isn't out to seduce his reader. It is a stunning insight into the filthy and corrupted world that is Hollywood. If you want to make it in Hollywood and you don't want to change your mind, go read Premiere magazine! If you wanna know what you're headed for, read Hollywood Babylon. A masterpiece!

Magnus Lindkvis

Babylon makes for an interesting and quick read, but the pictures are what really make this book. It's loaded with pictures throughout of the murders, affairs, drug busts that pull us in to old Hollywood. The book focuses mostly on the Hollywood of the 20s-40s -- perhaps because that's when most of the excitement took place. My main complaint would be that the author often uses elaborate superfluous language to describe the events-- almost like a sensationalist tabloid from that time.

Sure, when buying a book about Hollywood gossip one shouldn't expect stellar writing. But does the writing have to be quite as bad? The author desperately tries to be witty and tough, while his ramblings are just ridiculous. There is hardly any structure to the text, especially when several "cases" are written about in one chapter. Anger jumps from one person to the other, not bothering with providing an at least somewhat coherent text. I sometimes even wondered whether bits were cut from the text because of the sudden changes of topic and person. While some of the stories told are entertaining, the bad writing and the open malice (jealousy?) even spoil those bits. Most of the photos aren't good either, some of them have no caption at all, and several are in no way connected to the text.

The content - well, as I wrote, some of it is somewhat entertaining, but most of it is told in a childishly biased way. Often, background information is missing and it just happens too often that a story is started only to be abandoned in the next paragraph. All of this makes reading frustrating. The author's expressed disgust with those who wrote about celebrities' lives and scandals for a living is just as amusing as it is hypocritical (jealousy again?). This book isn't worth the paper on which it is (so cheaply) printed.

This book features a lot of threadworn info & anecdotes. However, there are a few stories I hadn't read about before. Loads of good, trashy pics ~ some quite shocking. The stand out would be, the extraordinarily sad car crash photos of Jayne Mansfield; she died with her boots on. And what incredibly stylish boots they were! (Anyone with a conscience would agree these horrific photos should have never been published)

Anger dishes out some absurdly titillating gossip on Hollywood celebs from the 1920s-1950s. While not all of it is terribly credible, Anger delivers his tidbits with the nasty exhilaration of a tabloid queen which makes for a fun read. But if you aren't interested in early American cinema, then there probably is little to interest you here.

If you like your Golden-Era Hollywood gossip served up hot with no-holds-barred, this is the best book for you! In graphic detail, with uncensored, disturbing photographs, the sordid truth and half-truths of Hollywood's greatest scandals are covered in these pages. No film fan and/or lover of the Grotesque could ask for more! Told slyly by the author with a wink and a chuckle.

i thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. but i know better than to take everything as fact. i look at it as being gossip about the stars which may or may not be true. it's a fun read if you enjoy reading about the stars and their frailties and failures. it makes them appear all too human and not larger than life

Utter trash and completely false. Tells crazy false lies to sell books. SO horrible, so unreadable and so so icky If you must read it, know there is nearly no facts what so ever in this tabloid brick. If you are interested in true hollywood history, you won't find it here.

Deliciously creepy, sordid true tales of Hollywood's golden age. Lots of black and white photographs lend this book a noir quality. Well-written by filmmaker Kenneth Anger, no stranger to decadence himself. Definitely recommended.

Reading this book probably wasn't the best way to learn of Hollywood's sordid trash, when I bought this ages ago, but I didn't have a movie encyclopedia at the time, which would have been useful, and I would've learned of the many tragedies that befell certain Hollywood stars in a more scholarly way. However, I didn't know that Peg Enwistle was the one who started a trend by diving off the LAND of the HOLLYWOODLAND sign, which now reads HOLLYWOOD.
The key scandals of the 1920's through 1950's are played out. The Fatty Arbuckle scandal of 1921, involving his alleged part in the death of starlet Virginia Rappe, was the O.J. Simpson of the 1920's is given a separate chapter. It took three trials to acquit him, but his career was finished. As Anger snidily writes, "The Prince of Whales had been harpooned." The others include Errol Flynn being accused of having sex with two underage girls, Mary Astor's diary, and the stabbing death of Lana Turner's lover John Stompanato by Cheryl Crane. Frances Farmer's nervous breakdown and collapse has some of snidiness in there, although he makes it clear that he does sympathize with her plight years before Nirvana did a song on her on their In Utero album.
Two mysterious and to this day still unsolved are probed, that of Thelma Todd, the Ice Cream Blonde, who may have been murdered by the mob instead of committing suicide, and the murder of director William Desmond Taylor, and those aren't as treated sensationally as other material.
Suicides are written with some embellishment in this book, i.e. Paul Bern, Jean Harlow's second husband, Marie Prevost, whose starving dog ate parts of her body, Lupe Velez, a.k.a. the Mexican Spitfire, and Carole Landis. Separate sections are written for Velez and Landis.
However, not all events and people get Angers' chops and slices. The Red Scare that ruined the lives of actors such as Gale Sondergaard and John Garfield, and the Hollywood Ten is presented as the travesty it was: "What it did do was ruin many lives and careers and tarnish the glamor of Tinsel Town." And the blackmailing practices of the snoopy, Confidential magazine, forcing performers to cough up to prevent them from revealing sordid things about performers. Thankfully, this terror was stopped when the founder of the magazine committed suicide after being named as a communist by Joe McCarthy. He's also contemptuous of the two gossip columnist Gorgons, Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons.
Towards the end, the decline of Hollywood in the 1960's is portrayed as one sordid death after another, ranging from La Monroe, Judy Garland, Ramon Novarro, and George Sanders. Somehow, I did not need to know that Garland died sitting on the toilet in her London flat.
Not a scholarly history of Hollywood's seamy side by any means. Rather, Kenneth Anger drags out Hollywood's dirty laundry and lays it out in a shamelessly sensationalistic and exploitational format, with catty sentences to boot, even including a few nude photos of starlets. Find a film encyclopedia instead. After reading this, I shudder to think what the movie was like.

Let face it, the stars all fascinate us. growing up in the late 50's and 60's I got to see all the old movies and we never learned much about the stars. Well this book and it's companion have it all, between Babylon I & II they fill in the gaps and the truth(or most of it) comes out). I just love these books and I would recomend them to anybody. Broderick Crawford in DRAG?? Ya gotta see it to beleive it. I have grown up in an era in which, people want the truth, Well In Jack Nicholson's words, Can you Handle the Truth?? If not don't buy this book, but if can,then buy it immediately. I've lost volume II twice to friends. Good luck and good reading!! Hollywood in 1920.. Marvelous!

This is a fine work which deserves 5 stars solely for the brilliance of Anger's description of the the burgeoning Hollywood of the 1910s and 1920s. Anger manages to create a picture of a Gatsby-ish yearning and nostalgia for something which did not fit traditional social values (the behaviour and morals of those making lots of money very quickly). There is too little writing in the book but there are great pictures which goes a long way to making up for this. All in all a fine fine book.