BBC acquires French crime series from boss of The Staircase
The BBC has acquired a new French crime thriller series from the filmmaker behind the hit true-crime documentary The Staircase.
Titled Sambre – Anatomy of a Crime, the series, which is based on true events, tells the story of the legal case of a serial rapist who attacked women over the course of three decades in the same location.
Created and written by Alice Géraud and Marc Herpoux, the six-part series, which will be available to BBC iPlayer and BBC TV channels, sees The Staircase's Jean-Xavier de Lestrade take on directing duties.
Related: Best streaming services in 2024
Heading up the cast are Six Women's Alix Poisson and The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon's Clémence Poesy. They are joined by Olivier Gourmet, Noémie Lvovsky, Jonathan Turnbull and Pauline Parigot.
"In Northern France in the late 1980s, women are being sexually assaulted along the same road by the Sambre river – with attacks taking place early mornings and in a similar style," reads the official synopsis.
"The police fail to get to grips with the extent of these assaults or make a connection between the cases."
Related: Best true-crime documentaries to watch right now
It continues: "The justice system is overwhelmed by the accumulating cases. It will take 30 years to catch a man, who never stopped attacking women and is responsible for at least 54 cases of rape or sexual assault.
"Sambre – Anatomy of a Crime is a thriller following the progression of the investigation, its repercussions from the '80s through to 2018 and the beginning of the #metoo era."
Speaking of the project, BBC's head of programme acquisition Sue Deeks said: "Sambre – Anatomy of a Crime is an absorbing series about France’s most notorious sexual predator, and of how he was allowed to slip through the cracks of the judicial system for over 30 years.
"Each episode is told from the perspective of a different character involved in the case – a victim, the judge, the mayor, the scientist, the police officer and finally, the perpetrator, and is a gripping examination of the flaws of a society and its institutions."
You Might Also Like
