paul2001sw-1

They don't make dramatists like Jimmy McGovern anymore. His latest film, 'Unforgiveable', bravely asks us to sympathise with a child abuser, in a story set in rows of terraced houses without front gardens and steeped in Catholic guilt. On one hand, it goes to obvious places, telling how terrible deeds live on in predictable ways; but McGovern deserves credit for showing that even those who do the worst things are human. However, while the message that abused people become abusers is undoubtedly true, it's also a little pat: in moving the deepest responsibility from the protagonist to his own abuser, it could be suggested that the script is merely passing the buck. Nonetheless, in what often seems like a merciless age, this is still a worthwhile, and welcome, drama to see on our television screens.

The BBC's 'Murder 24/7' is in many ways a straightforward copy of Channel 4's '24 Hours on Police Custody', albeit with even more relience on police bodycam footage and an exclusive focus on the worst of crimes. I find it riveting, and the odd thing is how often I end up sympathetising with the perpetrators, even when they have done the worst of things: what happens to a person to make them into a murderer? It's not exactly feel-good TV, but it is both gripping and (at least for me) thought provoking.