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Article: Presenting the facts. (the perilous path of the docudrama)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- April 7, 1990
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1990 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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"A TELEVISION program alters nothing," said Margaret Thatcher in the House of Commons on March 29th. She was wrong. The docudrama to which she was referring, Granada's "Who Bombed Birmingham?", which had been shown the night before, has clearly cast in doubt the conviction of six men for the bombing of two pubs in 1974, just as Yorkshire Television's "First Tuesday" helped to re-open the case against the Guildford Four. Television, which seizes and engages minds in a way unknown to books and newspapers, may not make a difference to a verdict in law; but it can alter the way the public views a case, the degree to which it trusts its own judiciary and police, and even its ...