JD Salinger, the elusive author of The Catcher in the Rye, was one of America’s most famous recluses and guarded his private life with fanatical dedication. Yet even he might have been impressed by the immense efforts being undertaken to keep details secret of a new documentary that has been made about his life and works.

Called simply Salinger, the film is the brainchild of Shane Salerno, who has spent nine years writing, producing and directing the project, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money. The move is a major shift in career for Salerno, best

known as a writer of mainstream blockbusters such as Alien vs Predator: Requiem andArmageddon.

But the promise of lifting the lid on the life of one of America’s most revered writers has proven a massive lure to Hollywood. Salinger has been bought up by independent film mogul Harvey Weinstein after he reportedly saw a private screening of it at 7.30 on the morning of the Oscars. Even though the screening did not apparently include all of the film’s most confidential revelations, he snapped it up immediately.

In fact, so impressed have its backers been with what Salerno and his team have uncovered they are also releasing a TV show based on the documentary and have struck a deal with publisher Simon and Schuster to bring out a book called The Private War of JD Salinger.

With Salerno not giving press interviews, there has been feverish speculation about details of new love affairs and rumours of unpublished manuscripts. One of the few hints is a statement Salerno made announcing the book deal. “The myth that people have read about and believed for 60 years about JD Salinger is one of someone too pure to publish, too sensitive to be touched. We replace the myth of Salinger with an extraordinarily complex, deeply contradictory human being. Our book offers a complete revaluation and reinterpretation of the work and the life,” he said.

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