Madelaine Mccann: A Global Obsession - Channel 5 Tue 19:00 18 Nov

Poe wrote:

Winston Smith wrote:

paracetamol wrote:The mccanns don't manage to get rid of the media and of us.
If they would not have insisted on the review of the investigation, they would have felt happier now.

I believe the McCanns campaigned for the review because they didn't think it would ever happen - to them, it's what they thought the parents of an 'abducted child' would do.

Enter Rebekah Brooks who, in my opinion, knew full well the extent of the McCanns' involvement and whispered in David Cameron's ear.

Be careful what you wish for . . .

Absolutely.

I also agree with Tigger about the psychology of the two main players and I also think Rebekah Brookes recognised them for what they are and played them. She was the McCanns' "friend"  while there was mileage in the abduction story but it was a story with a limited shelf life. There was never going be a happy ending and, as people tired of the sightings and charity runs, Madeleine stopped selling.

Rebekah is left with this hugely explosive story about what really happened. This is business, she will not kill the story unless it massively benefits herself and/or News International. However, there is no way to publish without incurring the wrath of the McCanns' legal team - hence the need for the review and subsequent investigation.

If and its a big if the time comes,"hoist by ones own petard" springs to mind.

I note that the Wail in its TV listings rag have it written up as "the presumed abduction".

caricature wrote:

Poe wrote:

Winston Smith wrote:

paracetamol wrote:The mccanns don't manage to get rid of the media and of us.
If they would not have insisted on the review of the investigation, they would have felt happier now.

I believe the McCanns campaigned for the review because they didn't think it would ever happen - to them, it's what they thought the parents of an 'abducted child' would do.

Enter Rebekah Brooks who, in my opinion, knew full well the extent of the McCanns' involvement and whispered in David Cameron's ear.

Be careful what you wish for . . .

Absolutely.

I also agree with Tigger about the psychology of the two main players and I also think Rebekah Brookes recognised them for what they are and played them. She was the McCanns' "friend"  while there was mileage in the abduction story but it was a story with a limited shelf life. There was never going be a happy ending and, as people tired of the sightings and charity runs, Madeleine stopped selling.

Rebekah is left with this hugely explosive story about what really happened. This is business, she will not kill the story unless it massively benefits herself and/or News International. However, there is no way to publish without incurring the wrath of the McCanns' legal team - hence the need for the review and subsequent investigation.

If and its a big if the time comes,"hoist by ones own petard" springs to mind.

Agree with all of the above. Also, for comparison's sake, newsrooms have files ready to go when they know the death of a famous person is expected. That's why, when a celebrity dies, the media are ready with a long and indepth review of that celebrity's career, highlights, lowlights, the whole story.

I expect Newsint has a very extensive similar file on the McCanns which won't see the light of day unless / until charges are brought against them. But can you imagine the papers they'd sell if that happened? It would be the newsmaker story of the year. And the British media does love to trash newsmakers who have formerly been the darlings of the press.

Would not post first time, hope not a duplicate. I found the final paragraph with its comment about public cynicism and the way Maddie was marketed by her parents incongruous, given that at face value the reports about this suggest that it is a programme supportive of the Mcs. It might turn out to be more balanced.

ETA : MARKET, VERB :

to do things that cause people to know about and want to buy (something)

The verb has been used by Frizell who knows its meaning and the difference [due to the final part of the definition] between marketing and publicising which is the first part of the definition. Marketing is a business word. The Mcs also wanted us to " buy " their story. There is no way this word should be used in a case of child abduction and the use of it in that notorious Vanity Fair interview was astounding, another case of Gerry not engaging his brain before opening his mouth. It was unwise to go against police advice re Maddie's coloboma, regardless of whether he believed publicising it would help get her safely back as she was easily recognised.... marketing was not a word to use, publicising was.

As a doctor he knows how drugs and medical machinery are marketed in his world, so why use this very business-oriented verb instead of the one he should have had on his mind..... simply getting the message about the distinctive eye out there?

Well now Frizell has used it and he will be using it in the programme I guess.... the context will be interesting.


Martin Frizell travels to Praia de Luz for Madeleine McCann: A Global Obsession, Tuesday at 7pm on Channel 5



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Former GMTV editor and journalist Martin Frizell travels to Praia de Luz in Portugal to retrace the final hours leading up to Madeleine's disappearance in Madeleine McCann: A Global Obsession, airing on Tuesday 18th November at 7pm on Channel 5. With exclusive insight he examines how a family's worst nightmare became breaking news and turned into one of the biggest stories of all time.

In Madeleine McCann: A Global Obsession, he interviews key players who witnessed the McCann tragedy unfold first hand. Kate Garraway, presenting GMTV at the time, took the first call live on air from a distressed family friend of the McCanns in Portugal. It was just after 8am on Friday 4th May 2007 and Jill Renwick was frustrated by the lack organisation on the ground in the hunt for Madeleine. After the show Frizell as the programme editor sent her on the first plane out to be one of the first British journalists on the ground in Portugal.

Kate Garraway, newsreader and television presenter said: "If you [Martin Frizell], as the editor, hadn't been in the gallery, giving instructions, I'm not sure that the producer of the day would have put that call through to the studio, because it's such an unusual thing it almost needed the kind of authority of the editor to say, "Let's do it." Well, suddenly the mood of the whole show changed, I think, from that moment on air, that it wasn't a fun Friday moment. You were aware that something big was happening."

Mary Nightingale, newsreader and television presenter said: "Some stories appear and then disappear quite quickly but this one really had legs. I think for any parent...any mother of a child that age it kind of hit me in the chest...In a way that not many stories do"

Hundreds more journalists followed. Everybody wanted the story. Madeleine McCann's angelic face sold newspapers and TV viewers around the world were gripped. No one could get enough. Everyone desperately wanted to be the first to answer the question 'What happened to Madeleine McCann?'

But after months and no new leads into her disappearance, the media turned on the parents.

Martin Frizell said: "What followed was a sustained inaccurate and malicious series of headlines in newspapers suggesting somehow that the McCanns had been involved with the death of their own daughter....they were so cruel that even the Chief Constable of Leicestershire himself, appealed to the press twice to show restraint but not all of them did."

Judy Bachrach, Contributing Editor at Vanity Fair said: "They [the McCanns] were told by child abduction experts "If you cry on television...the kidnapper might get off on that." Horrible though that sounds, so she had to keep a stoic face on television. She couldn't weep, she couldn't look distraught and so she looked kind of like a robot, she looked mechanical, not only to her friends or in Praia da Luz, but all over the World; on TV and on the Internet and in newspapers. So that backfired because everybody, including the police in Portugal, including the news outlets were saying, "How come the mother isn't crying? Her child is missing"

Michael Cole, PR advisor to Mohamed Al Fayed said: "The monstering of the McCanns by the British Media is one of the most shameful episodes of the British free press. It should not have happened. Perhaps it was the heat of the Algarve sun or the fact that they were a long way from Fleet Street, though a collective madness seemed to afflict the whole of the British Press corp."

Seven years on the hunt for Madeleine still commands headlines and front pages around the world but as the documentary explains it is not without controversy.

Amanda Platell, Daily Mail columnist said: "Her disappearance divided the Nation on class lines because I lost count of the number of people who wrote to me and said, "You know, if she had been the daughter of, you know, a couple of unemployed people living in Liverpool, she would have been off the front pages in a matter of days."

For the father of seven year old Daniel Entwistle who went missing on his way to buy sweets in 2003 this could not be truer. "They got Daniel on camera going past the garage and that's the last sight of him" said father David Entwistle. After the initial media interest, stories about Daniel were quietly dropped, and eleven years on he has still not been found.

Martin Frizell asks: "So why is Madeleine McCann still on the front pages all these years on? Sure, the story sells newspapers, it boosts ratings but it's because of you. You want to know. Whether it's because of your cynicism of the McCanns and the way they've marketed their daughter, because it's the unsolved mystery, because perhaps it's every parent's worst nightmare or there but for the grace of God go I. Whatever the reason, you'd have to have a cold heart indeed not wish closure on this for the McCanns and that story, the eventual discovery of Madeleine will be the biggest yet."

candyfloss wrote:Just a reminder that this programme 'Madeleine McCann - A global obsession' is on tonight for those who want to watch.

Channel 5 at 7 pm

Thanks CF I knew there was something I had to put in the planner.

Not forgetting the latest episode of "The Missing" at 21.00 on BBC1.

I missed the first 10 mins of that documentary.  Not too worried as it was the usual same old, same old.

What annoyed me towards the end was the narrator saying the McCann's managed to ban Goncalo's book and were still persuing him through the courts..............yet not a mention that the ban had been lifted and it was for sale again!

Tbh I found the programme quite watchable.

I found the journalist very fair in most of the things he spoke about and felt he put a lot of effort in to speaking about aspects of the case that are often omitted from reports.

Mary Nightingale irritated me though.

I couldn't watch it for the safety of my TV.

candyfloss wrote:I missed the first 10 mins of that documentary.  Not too worried as it was the usual same old, same old.

What annoyed me towards the end was the narrator saying the McCann's managed to ban Goncalo's book and were still persuing him through the courts..............yet not a mention that the ban had been lifted and it was for sale again!

There was a lot more then that Candyfloss. Not wearing my keyboard out typing it all though!

I just thought Mary Nightingale was saying such ridiculous things at times I thought she was acting.

candyfloss wrote:I missed the first 10 mins of that documentary.  Not too worried as it was the usual same old, same old.

What annoyed me towards the end was the narrator saying the McCann's managed to ban Goncalo's book and were still persuing him through the courts..............yet not a mention that the ban had been lifted and it was for sale again!

Channel 5 is the televisual equivalent of the Daily Star, Candyfloss, so pretty much what I expected.  The documentary was a leftover from Desmond's reign so designed to be pretty bland, the headlines they couldn't show more than likely belonging to his newspapers.

TheTruthWillOut wrote:

candyfloss wrote:I missed the first 10 mins of that documentary.  Not too worried as it was the usual same old, same old.

What annoyed me towards the end was the narrator saying the McCann's managed to ban Goncalo's book and were still persuing him through the courts..............yet not a mention that the ban had been lifted and it was for sale again!

There was a lot more then that Candyfloss. Not wearing my keyboard out typing it all though!

I just thought Mary Nightingale was saying such ridiculous things at times I thought she was acting.

My mother-in-law phoned half way through so I only sort of watched without hearing much.    Probably a good job

bellisa wrote:Tbh I found the programme quite watchable.

I found the journalist very fair in most of the things he spoke about and felt he put a lot of effort in to speaking about aspects of the case that are often omitted from reports.

Mary Nightingale irritated me though.

I am just watching it here now but I am finding the same. I found the opening clip of Kates friend on gmtv reporting on the broken shutters interesting. I dont find it very pro McCann so far. Quite the opposite in a very subtle way.

@Candyfloss. If you value your flat screen yes!

@Winston Smith. Isn't it odd that this Frizell/Garraway vehicle was on Channel 5? Editor/Producer and presenter of ITV's GMTV putting out this doc on a rival channel...um

Baldrick wrote:I couldn't watch it for the safety of my TV.

I had to hide all missiles or mine would have been rendered useless. What a load of Baloney that was. Frizzy was fairly neutral but of course his missus is a TM apologist and he would look a colossal idiot if and when the truth gets out.
Garraway and Nightingale were completely sold on the poor parents thing as mothers themselves and fell for the whole saint Katherine angle.
I did laugh when Mary said that Kate was beautiful and articulate and Gerry was erm ...articulate and.......
focused. Not handsome then Mary?Michael Cole who was Al Fayed spokesman when Diana died has had his page removed from Wikipedia. Wonder why?
TBH it didn`t surprise me that this would be another pro McCann fest with no more than a nod to unbiased reporting. They managed to lionise everyone from the press to G Amaral to the PJ while maintaining the parents had been unfairly treated. It`s a wonder the dogs didn`t get dissed too.
There will be some colossal red faces one day.

TheTruthWillOut wrote:@Candyfloss. If you value your flat screen yes!

@Winston Smith. Isn't it odd that this Frizell/Garraway vehicle was on Channel 5? Editor/Producer and presenter of ITV's GMTV putting out this doc on a rival channel...um

TV is pretty incestuous.  The only thing that would stop it is if Frizell's / Garraway's contracts with their respective companies prohibited it.

Settled down to watch it, and then family arrived for a visit...typical!

Seems though that I didn't miss much.

Robert Murat featured quite heavily - with possibly the most unflattering close up they could find of him.

I couldn't watch & think I shouldn't regret that ...

Châtelaine wrote:I couldn't watch & think I shouldn't regret that ...

quite - no added value really

Im not sure if I am watching the same documentary as everyone else but I think it is one of the most damning documentaries I have seen. It mentions government involvement, Clarence Mitchell, shows the smiling church photo, stresses how much they used the media, quotes GM saying he was "marketing Madeline", lists specific areas that had "corpse odour", highlights their love of sueing newspapers, a shot of GA's book..i could go on!

Sure it has the usual sympathisers but it is underpinned by suspicion and a media bracing themselves for a backlash imo.

Emerald wrote:Im not sure if I am watching the same documentary as everyone else but I think it is one of the most damning documentaries I have seen. It mentions government involvement, Clarence Mitchell, shows the smiling church photo, stresses how much they used the media, quotes GM saying he was "marketing Madeline", lists specific areas that had "corpse odour", highlights their love of sueing newspapers, a shot of GA's book..i could go on!

Sure it has the usual sympathisers but it is underpinned by suspicion and a media bracing themselves for a backlash imo.

It was rather reminding the public of a lot of things

Completely agree emerald. Apart from mary nightingale of course.

The other thing to annoy me was the tossed bed covers.

I really don't think it was a programme that had a lot of spin in it.

Emerald wrote:Im not sure if I am watching the same documentary as everyone else but I think it is one of the most damning documentaries I have seen. It mentions government involvement, Clarence Mitchell, shows the smiling church photo, stresses how much they used the media, quotes GM saying he was "marketing Madeline", lists specific areas that had "corpse odour", highlights their love of sueing newspapers, a shot of GA's book..i could go on!

Sure it has the usual sympathisers but it is underpinned by suspicion and a media bracing themselves for a backlash imo.

Passive aggression, maybe?  Love your optimism.