Drama in the dock: does The Fall glamourise violence against women?

AS THE CONTROVERSIAL TV SERIES RETURNS, ANNIE McLAUGHLIN ASKS WHETHER WRITERS AND DIRECTORS SHOULD PLAY A ROLE IN COMBATING MALE VIOLENCE – OR DOES ANYTHING GO WHEN IT COMES TO FICTION?

AS the nights shorten, broadcasters are unveiling their autumn TV schedules, and among the most eagerly awaited dramas is the third series of BBC2’s psychological thriller The Fall. Starring Gillian Anderson as DCI Stella Gibson, the enigmatic Metropolitan Police detective on the trail of Belfast serial killer Paul Spector played by Jamie Dornan, the critically acclaimed drama has become one of the channel’s most watched of the past decade, attracting more than three million viewers.

Not everyone is enthusiastic about the return of a programme which – alongside hits such as Game Of Thrones – has attracted opprobrium for its depiction of violence against women. In a departure from the “whodunnit” format of traditional crime drama, Spector was revealed to audience as the killer almost immediately.

Early episodes showed him hiding in plain sight as a seemingly devoted husband, father and professional bereavement counsellor, with scenes of him plotting and carrying out sadistic sexual attacks and murders juxtaposed with cosy domestic vignettes. His double life unravelled as Gibson closed in, their deadly game of cat and mouse culminating in a cliffhanger which saw Gibson cradling a potentially fatally wounded Spector in her arms.

Series three’s much-awaited first episode, screening this Thursday, sees Spector fighting for his life in hospital while Gibson clings to the hope that he will survive to be tried and convicted.

However, along with rave reviews, The Fall has attracted criticism for prolonged scenes of the stalking, torture and murder seen through the killer’s eyes, which some argued were at worst a glamorisation and sexualisation of the degradation and killing of women in the name of entertainment. Critic Terence Blacker accused the first series of presenting scenes of abuse and killing of women “as an intense sexual experience, at the excitingly taboo end of things”, albeit “without any crudely explicit detail”.

Eyebrows were also raised at the casting of ex-underwear model Jamie Dornan as Spector and his subsequent turn as sadomasochistic “sex symbol” Christian Grey in Fifty Shades Of Grey. While The Fall can perhaps take credit for reminding viewers that violent, murderous men can also be handsome and charming, it’s perhaps telling that even Dornan himself has made the link between the two roles, joking that with one job following another, he’d had “seven months straight of tying up women”.

The Fall’s writer Allan Cubitt says he finds accusations that his work sexualised violence against women “personally insulting”, claiming that they affected him so much that he was forced to consult with his 22-year-old daughter on whether he should pay them any mind. She assured him that he should not.

Series one certainly featured several drawn-out scenes of women being tortured and strangled, as they struggled against Spector and his restraints and lingering over their half-naked bodies in rooms lit like soft porn sets as he arranged and photographed them after death.

Cubitt says critics miss the point – that The Fall’s stance is one of a “particular criticism of patriarchy and the way male violence sits in the patriarchy”. He claims that “the most violent” act we actually see Spector commit is against another man.

Cubitt’s is certainly not the only big drama facing such charges. In particular, Game Of Thrones has been accused of excessive sexual violence against its female characters.