Madeleine McCann: No Change, A Tourist Site And Entertainment
MADDIE WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann
THE GUARDIAN: “Last night’s TV: Madeleine, One Year On: Campaign for Change”
It’s difficult to keep the visuals stimulating, too. We saw the McCanns at home in Leicestershire; Kate and Jerry talking on the sofa. But you can’t have two hours of sofa, so we joined them in a lot of taxis - in Portugal, London, Washington. And there were plenty of lingering tree shots - leafless, winter trees (this is a sad story, after all). And a flying heron … eh, what’s that about? Maybe the heron is an aguido, too. Does Sir Trevor know?
DAILY MAIL: “Madeleine holiday apartment becomes ’sick tourist attraction’ one year on from her disappearance”
Coachloads of journalists arrive every day. It’s sick.
DAILY MIRROR: “Tourists posing for pictures at McCann tragedy spots”
Pensioner Pamela Fenn, who lives above the McCanns’ holiday apartment, said: “It’s sick.
“They stand outside and then have photographs taken with their children.”
A source close to the McCanns said yesterday: “It’s disgraceful.”
It’s not as if the disappearance of a missing child is entertaining.
The floodlights at Premiership club Everton will be switched on this Saturday to mark the anniversary in a campaign called Light The Way Home.
LIVERPOOL ECHO: “Madeleine McCann: Family prepare for first anniversary of her disappearance”
People around the world are being urged to light a candle, shine a torch or turn on a porch lamp on Saturday night as a gesture of support for Madeleine’s family and friends.
A lighter held in the air?
Robert Murat, the third arguido in the case, is intending to maintain a low profile and will probably stay away from Praia da Luz on Saturday.
He said: “The anniversary is for a little girl who went missing - Madeleine.
“The anniversary is not about us, the McCanns, the PJ (Portuguese detectives) or anything else but a little girl going missing.”
THE TIMES: “Madeleine, One Year On: Campaign for Change; Escape from Alcatraz: The True Story”
Stefanie Marsh: Why must television do compassion? Why, when faced with a captive audience, a prime-time slot and a story that could, if they’d let it, tell itself, must television turn to mush and mutate into a series of treacly Hallmark bereavement cards?…
At one point Gerry McCann admits that his “wife is carrying on in a quasi-real existence”. What she is really doing is falling apart, but too much gloop from the director turned the McCanns’ terrible situation into a guilt trip that made me want to watch The Apprentice instead.
THE INDEPENDENT: “Last Night’s TV: Madeleine, One Year On: Campaign for Change ITV1″
“You can’t always blame the parents,” says Thomas Stucliffe:
They still get a lot of letters, the McCanns, sorting them out into boxes marked “well-wishers”, “ideas”, “psychics” and “nutty”. Incredibly, they also need a box marked “nasty” for messages such as the one that Gerry read out at the beginning of the film. “How can you use money given by poor people in good faith to pay your mortgage on your mansion? You fucking thieving bastards. Your brat is dead because of your drunken arrogance. Shame on you. I curse you and your family to suffer forever. Cursed Christmas. If you had any shame, you would accept full responsibility for your daughter’s disappearance and give all the money back. You are scum.” This heart-warming expression of support had been written inside a Christmas card. The Daily Express, by contrast, chose to print its hate mail on its own front page, confident that there were enough readers out there who would prefer infanticide to unresolved mystery – or to no McCann story at all. And all the time, the McCanns themselves live a life horribly suspended between what might have been and what could happen next, between “if only” and “maybe”.
Posted: 1st, May 2008 | In: Broadsheets, Madeleine McCann, Tabloids Comments (715) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
May 1st, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Chenier-there are no signs of new-found wealth-as yet-and with the whole world’s eyes on them-and this is their own doing with the media-what chance is there of spending it lavishly-Anyway they were pretty well off anyway-2 Doctors. Doesn’t add up to me as a motive for all of this.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Gerry confirmed last night that an abductor was seen. Thats good enough for me, absolute rubbish!
May 1st, 2008 at 8:43 pm
621 chenier
Thanks again for your reply. But they seem so certain and so devoid of emotion (again today on GMTV, Kate said something along the lines of their [family] life wasn’t as happy as it could be (I’m only paraphrasing, not quoting) when she was asked what life was like without M. No use of the words “devastated”, “unbearable”, “gut-liquidising” (OK, that’s more my phrase). It just doesn’t add up. Do you think they could possibly know where she is, alive and well?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:40 pm
605 whoops
JT and her partner O”Brien were interviewed the same day, they were at the Police station for 9 hours!!!!!!! It is rumoured that Jane changed her story about the sighting
my guess is that she and O”Brien were also confronted with other witness statements
giving different times that the Tapas 9 supposedly checked on the children.
I don”t think the PJ can expect to get any more information, except finding poor
Madeleines body and I would expect a decision soon, either charge or shelve the case.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:36 pm
613
Gloria Smudd Says:
May 1st, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Thanks for answering my query and I am bothered by one other thing: they seem so certain that M is still alive. Do you think there’s any possibility that she will be found alive and reunited?
———————————————
For all practical purposes, no.
If she was abducted, then as soon as the McCanns published her photograph her abductor(s) would have killed her.
And if she wasn’t abducted then she was already dead…
May 1st, 2008 at 8:34 pm
chenier 607:
I agree, they won’t go back to Portugal because they may be in legal trouble for leaving their children alone. I agree that PR is the tool they can use. I also noted that they have completely refused, either last night or this morning on the Radio 4 interview, to say that leaving defenceless children alone while dining “50 yards” away was wrong. It was described as a different method of “parenting” (new verb there).
(got to get dinner out of the oven). Gone …
May 1st, 2008 at 8:34 pm
The McCons must be having acting lessons as they are getting better in front of the media, perhaps pinky is there teacher now and not there mouth piece.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:31 pm
612
whoops Says:
May 1st, 2008 at 8:23 pm
chenier-Apart from 2 mortgage payments, which is hardly an enormous life-changing sum-How have they or how can they in the future actually spend it on themselves-it is all going into the fund any appearance money. Again-I am not pro-McCann or anti-I just can’t see what they personally have to gain.
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Actually, we have no idea of where the money in the Fund has gone to.
And if you read the terms and conditions of the Fund you will see that it provides for making payments to Madeleine’s family.
It’s perfectly legal.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:30 pm
601 Gloria Smudd
I honestly can”t see how they can carry on this charade if they are guilty, and you
would have to be completely devoid of feeling not to break down and confess at some
time. Maybe there was an abductor, who knows? My guess is the timelines are wrong
and all the Tapas 9 know they did not check on the kids as often as they said. Since
they are all Proffessional people and didn”t want to be seen as negligent, they agreed
to the times and that they would stick by them, thereby saving their ar..s. Now, they
probably know they can be charged with neglect, so that”s why the McCanns don”t
want to go back to Portugal.
I”m sitting on the fence when it comes to them being responsible for Madeleine”s demise, even they know deep down that she is probably not alive.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:28 pm
613
Sadly, I would say no.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:26 pm
613
Not on your nellie will she be found alive.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:26 pm
601 Gloria Smudd
narcissism?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Thanks for answering my query and I am bothered by one other thing: they seem so certain that M is still alive. Do you think there’s any possibility that she will be found alive and reunited?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:23 pm
chenier-Apart from 2 mortgage payments, which is hardly an enormous life-changing sum-How have they or how can they in the future actually spend it on themselves-it is all going into the fund any appearance money. Again-I am not pro-McCann or anti-I just can’t see what they personally have to gain.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Mods and Admin
Am I that predictable?
M and a
No, but we are all defensive
May 1st, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Uta Hagen
Where have you been? Were you abducted.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
You can call them everything you like but not humble….
May 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
601 Gloria Smudd
I can answer that question with one word and that is M O N E Y.
Hello every one, I’ve been away for some time and just started catching up on the posts.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
601
Gloria Smudd Says:
May 1st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
I can’t work out for the life of me why they would continue to arrange this high media-profile if they were running scared of anything. Can you?
—————————————————–
Yes.
They are terrified of going back to Portugual.
They are afraid that they will be charged, convicted and possibly imprisoned.
Of course, they may be even more scared of being charged, convicted and possibly imprisoned here.
PR is all they have.
And then there’s the money…
————
May 1st, 2008 at 8:20 pm
604-Val-No sorry I’m always a way behind-I meant last week at the interviews.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:18 pm
601 Gloria-This is something I always have great trouble with-Unless it is a huge double bluff.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:16 pm
599 whoops
The report was not about JT, it was a supposed new witness, probably another
red herring to waste more time, don”t take any notice unless it is mentioned again.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:15 pm
596
mary Says:
May 1st, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Seriously, if no arrests are made soon is it realistic to expect that outcome?
Now we have had the great anniversary extravaganza of mawkish claptrap by the media might they just fade back into obscurity give or take the odd “sighting” and computerized image of how she might look now?
——————————————————-
Not if the McCanns can help it.
House prices are falling, which is seriously bad news for anyone with a stonking big mortgage and very little capital in the first place, goodbye riches beyond the dreams of avarice, hello negative equity.
Kate has announced that henceforth she won’t be working as a doctor.
Which is just as well, since the GMC would have insisted on her brushing up on her professional knowledge in general, and the childcare bit in particular.
She’s not exactly highly employable, even if she does have a mate who’s a recruitment consultant.
So the McCanns are in deep water, financially, and their only sources of income is Gerry, who’s not exactly a leading light in his profession, and the Fund.
It’s not very difficult to see their motivation in all this…
May 1st, 2008 at 8:13 pm
598 chenier
I have, apart from that dratted bear ..
May 1st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Smudd’s verdict on the doctormentary last night + their interviews on GMTV + their interview on Radio 4 + their interview on This Morning (which I did not see because I was at work: befuddling.
I am having trouble working out why, if they have anything to hide, they would keep themselves so much in the public eye and open their every gesture and action to examination by a public which is, in some quarters, nothing but critical. And don’t shoot me down as a pro, because I saw lots of ear-scratching and dodgy eye-movements and I have always said that no abduction could have taken place if those children had been with their parents, but I can’t work out for the life of me why they would continue to arrange this high media-profile if they were running scared of anything. Can you?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:11 pm
596 mary
They keep asking people to look for Madeleine, if you saw her now, a year later
wearing Sunglasses, would you recognise her? that”s why they know new Posters
would be useless and I honestly don”t know what else they can do. A few years ago,
I think it was in Portugal, a couple walking along with their son ( I think about 8/9yrs
old) walking yards away from them. Suddenly, he is gone and not a sign of him since, yet every year the Parents go back to the scene to try to find him and remember him.
He would be 17 now.
If you saw the interview, everyone at OC and the Police were searching until 4.30am, but the McCanns started their search at 6a,m,……..they are truly not normal in our
sense of the word!!!!!!
May 1st, 2008 at 8:04 pm
582-Val
Don’t know answer to first question-could have been having a fag to 2nd question.
BTW what has JT changed her story about?
That she saw a man, but he wasn’t carrying a child.
Saw a man but child didn’t have pink pyjamas on.
That she didn’t see a man.
That he didn’t look like Ringo Starr
That she was never on holiday in PDL.
That she’s never met the McCanns.
That she isn’t a doctor.
May 1st, 2008 at 8:02 pm
594
Gloria Smudd Says:
May 1st, 2008 at 7:55 pm
————————————–
And good evening to you, Gloria!
Have you been spared the relentless onslaught of McCann media mania today?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:02 pm
591 Jo
Who is this mysterious Policeman, would it be the same one mentioned on here this
morning who was saying the McCanns should go back to Portugal?
May 1st, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Seriously, if no arrests are made soon is it realistic to expect that outcome?
Now we have had the great anniversary extravaganza of mawkish claptrap by the media might they just fade back into obscurity give or take the odd “sighting” and computerized image of how she might look now?