'Scarface and the Untouchable' offers new insight into Capone, Ness — even as it trashes earlier histories

"Scarface and the Untouchable" by Max Allan Collins and A. Brad Schwartz; William Morrow (736 pages, $29.99)

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It is more than a bit dispiriting to start reading a book that begins with an introduction trashing previous attempts to tell the story it is about to present.

But that is precisely what "Scarface and the Untouchable: Al Capone, Eliot Ness, and the Battle for Chicago" does, ripping into, among many, Chicago's David Mamet, who wrote director Brian De Palma's 1987 movie, "The Untouchables."

While calling the film "well-made and entertaining," the introduction damns the Mamet screenplay, saying that his inventiveness shows "a lack of respect not just