Living in the end days of freedom

A Memoir to keep you up at nights

It’s refreshing to go back in time and read a roller coaster of a Memoir set in the late twentieth century. 'Full On' is definitely a time warp, a nostalgic account of a hedonistic time when post WW2 born Youth now described as ‘baby boomers’ were free to lead their lives in complete freedom. In other words, Denys Hatton’s no holds barred autobiography is a well-written free-wheeling account of the pre-internet days when people were able to lead their lives without the fear of being snooped on by Social Media.
‘I firmly believe we make our own luck and are the masters of our destinies. What happened in those years can only be described as ‘larger than life,’’ is a memorabile quote from Mr Hatton.
His account of his adventurous life is so enthralling, I simply couldn’t put his Memoir down. I was gripped, reading about his controversial life from his early days of having been born in 1949 in New Zealand with parents, who in today’s world would be described as progressive. Mr Hatton’s life smoothly escalates from being a popular figure in 'Party Central' during his New Zealand teens until his life organically exploded into an existence of international travel with a retinue of loyal girlfriends, wives and children.
Mr Hatton’s exciting life exuded glamour especially when he was on work assignments in Cannes on a regular festival basis, meeting, befriending and escorting women like Bianca Jagger and the iconic model Veruschka to Cannes film premiers.
Everything including lifelong friendships came naturally to this dare-devil author, who in a lighter vein, even reminisced about show business friendships including the chanteuse Amanda Lear.
Besides the author’s Boy’s Own adventures about exploring the globe, ‘Full On’ could serve as an outdated and historical international travel map where most continents were then easily accessible to curious travellers without fear of oppression. The book could also be regarded as an educational and explicit manual about sailing, for Mr Hatton proved himself to be a seasoned one navigating yachts and boats which came in especially useful when he effortlessly fell into a life of drug smuggling. He justified this in the book by saying he only dealt with cannabis, which in those heady days was universally strictly illegal.
Unlike Howard Marks’ ‘Mr Nice’ autobiography, whose Memoir involved institutions like the IRA and the Mafia, in comparison ‘Full On’ is less ‘heavy.’ Compared to Mr Marks’ countless aliases and numerous bogus companies to aid his contraband smuggling life, Mr Hatton’s thrilling account of his various aliases during his smuggling days is on a lesser scale, and at times is almost comedic. It’s unbelievable what he illegally got away with, leading successful lives under varied names and identities for years in cities like New York’s Manhattan, London and Paris.
Even Mr Hatton’s inevitable incarceration in USA prisons when the law/FBI finally caught up with him is in my view, not such a terrifying ordeal. He sensibly decided to go along with prison life, and his matter-of-fact descriptions of his mundane but interesting jobs, the guards, mostly empathetic and his white and non-white collar fellow inmates seemed to me a bearable existence rather than a Midnight Express hell hole.
‘You can’t make it up!’ was one of Denys Hatton’s pet phrases during his scribed life story. He’s right. His extraordinary action-packed life has unfolded like a twist driven movie, and if there is any justice, a streamer like Netflix should adapt ‘Full On’ into a series of unlimited episodes with Denys Hatton as advisor or even showrunner!