Categories: uncategorized
Date: 27 October 2006 13:43:41
I watched a programme about Lord Longford.
Very interesting stuff and incredibly well made. It captured the ambiguities of human relationships perfectly. With Brady you knew that he was slightly unhinged and entirely unreliable and yet his barbs were so sharp that they still hit home. With Hindley you wanted to trust her and yet could never be quite sure that she was being straight. And with Longford himself he seemed to be motivated entirely by a deep understanding of forgiveness and a rock-solid appreciation of the extent of forgiveness that is available, and yet still sometimes he seemed out of his depth and deluded, possibly under Hindley's spell, or even driven by his own pride in what he could achieve. It's very tempting to believe that Hindley was mostly innocent, just affected by Brady's spell, but there has to be doubt about that interpretation, and the film did a very good job of offering that view and yet subtly undermining it. It seems that if she had been released there is no way that she would have done anything like that again, and consequently a tragedy that she spent her life behind bars because of the feelings of a mob. But who can say if that's right - who can know what was in her mind? Certainly not someone like me who never knew her. And was it a waste of Longford's life to campaign about her case or a triumphal example of Christian spirit battling an evil and conceited ("I'm better than her") world? I suppose the only positive note I can find in the whole thing is the comparison with the other I and M couple, Huntley and Carr. There the distinction between the behaviour of the two was much clearer and yet the tabloids still seemed to want blood from the female culprit. So I find it hugely reassuring that with that case at least things seemed to have moved on and we look like being at a stage where we can leave Carr to get on with what is left of her life.