Fred and Rose West are two of Britain’s most infamous serial killers. The couple murdered at least 12 young women between 1967 and 1987, including Fred’s stepdaughter, eight-year-old Charmaine. Their bodies were buried in their Gloucester home, which the press dubbed a “house of horrors”. When there was no more room in the cellar, the mutilated, dismembered girls were put in the ground of the garden.
The harrowing details of the Wests’ murders have been raked over time and time again, in TV dramas, true-crime documentaries and podcasts. Yet we are apparently not done with hearing just how depraved the couple were. Netflix’s new three-part documentary Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story recounts the story yet again.
Before watching, I struggled to pinpoint who would be so interested in the series. Anyone with a passing interest in true crime will already be familiar with the Wests’ crimes, and the case is so famous across the UK, I’d be surprised if any British Netflix subscriber could learn anything new.
The Wests met when Rose was just 15 and Fred was in his thirties (Photo: Netflix)But it turns out director Dan Dewsbury isn’t too concerned with us at home, instead using Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story as an attempt at bringing peace to the friends and family of the couples’ victims. “It’s for Alison,” says Dezra Chambers, sister to Alison who was killed by Fred West at just 16. “But also for me so that I can have a bit of closure. I don’t have that at the moment.”
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It’s an admirable, sympathetic take on the true-crime genre – care and respect for victims’ families is something critics always wish there was more of. But the rest of the documentary can’t keep up with the heartbreaking, honest testimony of these still grieving relatives. There’s not much new to learn about the decades-old case from the film, and the most interesting people connected – the Wests’ surviving children, Fred’s appropriate adult during police questioning, Janet Leach, with whom he reportedly grew very close – are only seen via decades old interviews. I found myself waiting for revelations that never came.
The three parts take a simple approach to telling the story. In the first, “Fred”, we are told of how police are made aware of Fred’s potential violence via his children. If they were naughty, they were told they would end up “under the patio” like their sister. Social services, who already made regular visits to the West house, grew alarmed at hearing this and informed the police. That sister was Heather, Fred and Rose’s first daughter, murdered by her mother at 16 years old. As the police searched for her remains, they found more bones buried in the back garden. Soon, the case had snowballed into one of the most notorious murder investigations in British history.
Dezra Chambers – sister of victim Alison – says she took part in the film for ‘closure’ (Photo: Netflix)Among the already familiar archive footage, the Wests’ crimes are relayed via never-before-seen videos from the investigation and recently discovered tapes from Fred’s police interviews. They reveal a detached, curiously unemotional man, whose main concern is to not let officers know that his wife was in on his heinous acts. It’s unnerving to watch him point out the graves in his own backyard as casually as if he were explaining where he grows vegetables.
With the new sources focusing on Fred, Rose’s involvement is left a little in the shadows. And while it stops at framing her as another one of Fred’s victims, much is made of the fact that she was just 15 when they met and there is reference to the fact that she might have been abused as a child. There’s no such attempt to explain why Fred might have turned into such a predatory killer.
The minority unfamiliar with the Wests’ case might find Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story interesting, but I felt grubby and prurient for once again delving into their “house of horrors”. The series’ saving grace is its attempts to do right by the victims’ loved ones. I hope they got more out of filming than I did watching.
‘Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story’ is streaming on Netflix
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