Liverpool Sound and Vision
Cast: David Morrissey, Lee Ingleby, Toby Jones, Liz White, Michael McElhatton, Jack Deam, Toby Jones, Chloe Harris, Steven Waddington, Jasmine Lee-Jones, Kris Hitchin, Stephen Tompkinson, Liam Garrigan, Christopher Hatherall, John Henshaw, Victoria Myers, Shaun Thomas, Charley Webb, James Clay, Emma Cunniffe, Adam Long, Kate Rutter, Dorothy Atkinson, Sorcha Groundsell, Jill Halfpenny, Marcus Fraser, Daniel Mays, Charlotte Tyree, Paul Brennen, Colin R. Campbell, Alexa Davies, Emma Williams, Nicola Stephenson, Robert James-Collier, Daisy Waterstone, Mark Stobbart, Sammy Winward, Katherine Kelly, Nigel Betts.
We live in a period of time when infamy is a selling point, where a single name or moniker can reopen wounds in a local area, or in the national mindset, with a certain ease; and whilst we must never forget the terrible crimes committed, the absolute horror, the repulsion felt, we must be able to see a dramatic reconstruction of the reality behind the period with a hopeful dispassionate historic eye…a gut full of anger and disgust at the perpetrator of offence, but with an eye that sees through their story and concentrates instead on the victim, to show their life before it was taken by the most sick in society.
The Long Shadow deals with the hideous events that befell a large number of women in Leeds, Huddersfield, Manchester, and Bradford at the hands of Peter Sutcliffe, and the less than effective way in which the police investigation under George Oldfield and his commander Ronald Gregory was held, a systematic failure blinded by ignorance, arrogance, blind obsession, the unwillingness to seek advice from female officers; and in a series of events that were baffling and almost contemptable made a mockery of detective work that allowed an evil man to continue his reign of terror for years.
Whilst Sutcliffe is highlighted as a criminal should be, it is to those that must never be forgotten, the women who were murdered, the ones who survived, the children who lost their mothers, and in a similar way to that in which the author Hailee Rubenhold progressively opened up the debate of the nature of victimhood in her acclaimed book The Five, so we must look to the absurd, outrageous, deliberately criminal way that the patriarchal system of detective work was nothing short of myopic and violent in its association in labelling all as either ‘prostitutes’ or ‘innocent’.
The seven-part series thankfully does not shy away from highlighting the egos at large, the self-centred arrogance that held court in the various Yorkshire police departments, the sense of monumental fault that can be laid at the door of authority, but also the sense of shame we must feel as a nation that offered no empathy from Government, quick to describe wrongly, and instead further pushed the narrative that it was the women who were at fault.
The Long Shadow is a story known, but that does not mean we can ignore it, but what we must ensure is that the callous mistakes showed with detail by the direction of Lewis Arnold and the insightful writing of George Kay are forever etched in our minds, because there will always be people in positions of power such as those in charge of the original investigation who would easily continue the narrative if it meant that they could stoke their ego rather than see the nation alter its perspective, especially when we look into the reasons why many turn to the activity of selling sex when there is a national crisis looming large on the purses and wallets of its citizens.
Forensic and delivered to create conversation, The Long Shadow may be the story of an evil man but is the wickedness of those charged with our safety that is the real statement that requires understanding.
Ian D. Hall