Heaven and Mel

By: Joe Eszterhas

Narrated by: Tim Halligan

Length: 4 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's Summary

Joe Eszterhas and Mel Gibson had a global confrontation in April of this year over their movie The Maccabees. Heaven and Mel is Eszterhas' explosive, unabridged, no-holds-barred account. It is a Hollywood story, but it's not. It is the story of love and hatred, of anti-Semitism and fathers and sons, and of a movie star's tragic sexual obsession. It is the story of God and the Devil, devastating but often hilarious. It is Joe Eszterhas at his best: two-fisted, movingly sensitive, always outrageous.

©2012 Joe Eszterhas (P)2014 Audible Inc.

Avoid: Joe's revenge for wasting time with Mel

Avoid this title, it's not badly written but it appears to be Joe Eszterhas's attempt at revenge against Mel Gibson for wasting his time developing a screenplay that wasn't greenlit. This feud is not something the average reader need be dragged into, nor should the reader functionally be compensating Eszterhas for lost earnings. Most of this was in a 9 page letter Eszterhas wrote to Gibson, that (somehow) became public after the project's collapse.

Extended view of TMZ

So sorry I purchased this disturbing and vile book. I stopped after 40 minutes. To make money exploiting other people's lives and hardships is not my idea of journalism. The author had obviously a Huge bone to pick and used God for his justification.

Sounds like a has-been looking for a hand-out

Coming from one of the most deplorable and rumor-ridden screenwriters in Hollywood history, or should I say lore, this nonsensical book is more like a complaint from an angry former employee than a bipartisan addressing of one man's questionable relationship with the monster that is the world of Hollywood.

Just because Joe found Jesus doesn't mean the rest of the world did too, clearly Mel didn't. If Joe was willing to put his transgressions aside to work with Mel at the beginning... Sorry, but money talks doesn't it Joe.

This was a waste of 4 hours of my eardrums shelf life. Im sorry eardrums, I'll make it up to you later.

These Two Deserve Each Other

This is what you get when you mix Hollywood, two sad sacks and a bunch of mumbo-jumbo religion together. Sure, Mel is a trainwreck, but Joe Eszterhas ain't much better. This thing is spiteful, with repetitive reads of emails, phone messages and private conversations; Eszterhas does everything but give out Mel's phone number and home address, It's interesting, I'll give it that, but honestly they are both pretty pathetic. He talks about a "pane of glass" that was always between him and Mel but from reading this, it was more like a mirror. One of these guys found repentance through their nutty religion, the other repugnance. So what?

Pure Garbage

Will make you dumber just for having downloaded this title. Spare your mind. Save your soul.

Mad Mel

In his detailed narrative, Esterhas is almost like a guest at dinner who is so upset over an event that he has just witnessed that he has to unburden himself with a story that he knows needs to be told. The nature of an audio book makes that an especially personal, worthwhile experience for the listener.


“Heaven and Mel” is the articulate and convincing narrative of the disturbing story of a Hollywood superstar with almost psychotic mental issues, which manifest themselves through profane-laden, bigoted, seemingly-uncontrollable, outbursts. Gibson’s inner demons are wound so tightly, they explode in fury whenever he loses control. Because of his continual and casual anti-Semitism, racism and ethnocentrism, I believe the intemperate explosions reveal the actual inner workings of a disturbed mind, not mere ramblings that are profane for the very sake of being profane.


I don't agree that the book is simply an anti-Gibson invective/screed by a bitter would-be associate. Esterhas credibly and seemingly-fairly paints an intimate portrait of a man whom he expected to like, but whose inexplicable ravings converted an incipient friendship into revulsion. He provides enough detail, along with his commentary on his feelings throughout their relatively brief association, that his story is more than creditworthy. The explanation is simple – Gibson is a viciously bigoted, self-centered, bad man.


Before listening to the book, it bothered me that Gibson’s despicable behavior attracted so much curiosity to him and his movies that he became even richer than he was before. After listening to the book, however, I was gratified to realize that he can never enjoy the fruits of his fortune because of his raging inner demons.


Hopefully, the last chapter has been written on the life of Mel Gibson. If not, I suspect the end will be violent … likely self-inflicted by Gibson, but, possibly, inflicted on anyone who is unfortunately in his orbit.

the real mel gibson

shame hes nuts. he needs help. hes a dangerous ass hole.not watching his movies . hes preduce

A bitter angry man

Eszterhas is a good man who clearly has more integrity than Gibson ever had. Just an angry bitter man whose life is the envy of 99.999% of the planet but still filled with bile.

Joe and a Shmoe

This book reveals nothing about Mel Gibson that we already don't know except for the fact he is way more cunning than I would of imagined, Eszterhas on the other hand comes off like a religious bumpkin (who of course became deeply religious after years of drug and alcohol abuse), seems so naïve that is hard to believe he wrote Basic Instinct when he seems to have none.

Gibson who is portrayed by Eszterhas as a dangerous madman hell bent on killing his ex, played Eszterhas like a fiddle and Joe is obviously bitter about it and wrote this book to put Mel in a bad light but unwittingly did the same to himself.

Mel Gibson is a giant jerk who has risen to the top in a world full of giant jerks, what else is new! , I watch movies to be entertained, if I stopped watching movies because the people making them were unscrupulous there would be nothing to watch!

Great story, annoying second character narration

Narrator’s voice for Mel and others was extremely hard to listen to,though overall a story kept me listening.