MADDIE FILES
Is the Madeleine McCann documentary still on Netflix and what have her parents Kate and Gerry said about it?
THE Disappearance of Madeleine McCann is being examined in a new Netflix documentary.
Here is what the series is all about and why the missing girl's parents have refused to take part.
3
How can I watch the Madeleine McCann Netflix documentary?
The documentary is available to watch NOW on Netflix (from Friday, March 15, 2019.)
It was first commissioned by Netflix in 2017 and examines the case of the missing three-year-old as well as interviews with key figures and investigators.
The streaming site had been hoping it would be ready to screen in 2018 but the project reportedly took longer than expected.
It's also thought producers had wanted to create an eight-part series but it's now just a two-parter.
To get a glimpse of the documentary, you can watch the trailer above.
3
Are Madeleine's parents in the documentary?
Maddie's parents Kate and Gerry refused to take part, despite numerous requests from producers over the last 18 months.
The couple's pals, who were on that fateful holiday with them when Maddie went missing, and their former spokesperson Clarence Mitchell blasted the film, which is reported to have cost £20million, saying: "We want nothing to do with it."
In 2018, The Sun reported that the McCanns have declined to be involved because the Metropolitan Police's investigation is still active.
Ahead of the doc’s release, Kate and Gerry McCann said in a statement that they believed the film could “hinder” the hunt for their little girl.
They said: “We do not see how this will help the search for Madeleine, and, particularly given there is an active police investigation, could potentially hinder it.”
What does the Madeleine McCann Netflix documentary cover?
Netflix are hoping the documentary will be a massive hit like its other successful true crime dramas including Making A Murderer and Abducted in Plain Sight.
The search for the toddler became the most high-profile missing person investigation in history.
But despite a Portuguese police probe and an £11million Scotland Yard investigation, Kate and Gerry McCann's search for their daughter goes on.
Cops are waiting to find out from the Home Office if they will be granted extra public funding to continue their painstaking search for the missing girl.
Three-year-old Maddie vanished from a holiday apartment in Portugal’s Praia da Luz in May 2007.
She had been left sleeping with her younger twin siblings while her parents were dining in a nearby tapas restaurant.
3
Does the documentary claim Madeleine is still alive?
Yes - the doc believes the young girl is still alive.
It suggests that people traffickers abducted the three-year-old in Portugal in 2007 - as a top child protection cop insists the 12-year mystery will be solved.
The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann features 40 experts and key figures in the case, some of whom argue she was taken to another foreign country.
Jim Gamble, the top child protection cop in the UK’s first Maddie investigation, says: “I absolutely believe that in my lifetime we will find out what has happened to Madeleine McCann.
“There’s huge hope to be had with the advances in technology. Year on year DNA is getting better. Year on year other techniques, including facial recognition, are getting better.
“And as we use that technology to revisit and review that which we captured in the past, there’s every likelihood that something we already know will slip into position.”
The documentary also claims Madeleine is likely to have been kept alive by child traffickers because, as a middle-class British girl, she would be more financially valuable.
LATEST ON MADELEINE MCCANN
Julian Peribanez, the private investigator hired by the McCanns, explains: “They usually go for lower-class kids from third world countries — that’s the main supplier of these gangs.
“The value that Madeleine had was really high because if they took her it’s because they were going to get a lot of money.”
Executive producer of the documentary, Emma Cooper, said: “We’re trying to lay out as much detail as we can about the case - and if it could jog someone’s memory in some way then that would be amazing.
“Keeping any search for what happened to Madeleine in the consciousness - particularly globally - is something that’s so important.
“As we show in the documentary, other children are found - so you have to hope.”
Madeleine McCann's father Gerry McCann describes 'disbelief, panic and terror' at moment he realised daughter was missing in rare interview
Topics