USA TODAY International Edition
True- crime series gets at heart of survivors’ dilemma
Spoiler alert! Contains details about the series finale of Netflix’s “Unbelievable,” now streaming.
What does it mean to listen to – and believe – survivors of sexual assault?
That’s the question Netflix miniseries “Unbelievable” delicately and devastatingly explores over the course of its eight- episode season, which is based on a true story and ends with a glimmer of hope for 18- year- old rape victim Marie ( Kaitlyn Dever).
BETH DUBBER/ NETFLIX
After being raped by an intruder in 2008, her story was fiercely questioned by disparaging Lynnwood, Washington, authorities. Marie recanted, claiming she made up the assault, and was charged with filing a false police report.
Fast forward three years, when detectives Grace Rasmussen ( Toni Collette) and Karen Duvall ( Merritt Wever) close in on a serial rapist in Colorado and discover photos of Marie among his belongings.
Chris McCarthy ( Blake Ellis) – who is based on the real- life Marc O’Leary – is sentenced to more than 300 years in prison for raping Marie and five other women, and Marie is refunded the $ 500 she was required to pay as part of a plea deal for the false- reporting charge.
No longer willing to accept “good enough,” the young woman decides to sue the city and finds a lawyer, who astutely remarks, “No one ever accuses a robbery victim of lying, or someone who says they’ve been carjacked – it doesn’t happen. But when it comes to sexual assault?”
“There are systemic prejudices in the criminal justice system, and that ( line) really highlights that,” Collette says. “The fact that a victim could be treated as a suspect, knowing what it takes for a woman to come forward. It takes a lot of guts, and she’s already been traumatized. The level of detail in the show is very realistic and incredibly infuriating.”
Marie delivers an equally potent and even more heartbreaking speech in the series’ penultimate episode, when she reluctantly attends a courtmandated counseling session with a therapist, Dara ( Brooke Smith). During a seemingly innocuous conversation about zombie movies, Dara gently tells
Marie that she deserves love and that she believes her.
Marie is still shaken by having her story dismissed for so long, along with the professional, personal and emotional fallout of the rape itself.
“I know I’m supposed to say if I had to do it over again, I wouldn’t lie,” Marie says. “But the truth is, I’d lie earlier and I’d lie better. I’d just figure it out on my own, by myself. No matter how much someone says they care about you, they just don’t.”
“That line in particular is really important for people to see,” says Dever, who starred in Olivia Wilde’s “Booksmart” this summer.
“To me, it was a very visceral feeling to actually say that, because sometimes you just feel so helpless. And that is the conversation we’re trying to change in making this: We have to start trusting survivors; we have to start believing them from the start. We had many goals with the show, but treating each other with care and compassion is really at the core.”
“Unbelievable” extends that compassion to the ostensibly callous Detective Parker ( Eric Lange), who all but forces Marie to recant her story through a series of grueling interrogations in the first episode.
He’s remorseful and ashamed in the finale after learning Marie was telling the truth, admitting to Rasmussen that he’s unsure whether he still belongs on the force.
“I, as an actress, wanted to shame him in a way, and ( creator Susannah Grant), who was directing that episode, reminded me to keep pulling back,” Collette says.
“Grace understands that you can have a bad day, you can get it wrong, and I love that the show is dogmatic in that way. It doesn’t demonize that character, it just happens to have been mishandled.”