Ian Brady: Endgames of a Psychopath, Channel 4, review

By Neil Midgley10:34PM BST 20 Aug 2012
Channel 4's documentary on the dying days of the serial killer has unearthed some compelling new information - but the families of Brady's victims are still left without answers, writes Neil Midgley.


Documentaries don’t often unearth stories that make front-page news, but that’s exactly what Channel 4’s Cutting Edge strand has managed to do with Ian Brady: Endgames of a Psychopath. On Friday, the film’s key revelation – that Brady may have written a letter detailing where the only unfound victim of the Moors Murders is buried – led the news bulletins and was splashed all over the tabloids.

The central figure in those news stories, as in the documentary, was Jackie Powell. She has been Ian Brady’s mental health advocate since 1999 and, based on interviews she gave in this Channel 4 film, was arrested on Thursday of last week on suspicion of preventing the burial of a body. This dramatic turn of events shows just how far the documentary’s story had shifted from its initial conception in the spring, when its director, Paddy Wivell, planned to tell a very different story.

Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/9487650/Ian-Brady-Endgames-of-a-Psychopath-Channel-4-review.html