49 Up (2006)

Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Undescribable Perfection

From my favorite movies..

A lot of fun.

Kangamommy: The purpose of this series is NOT whether you like the kids. The point is, well into adulthood, is Paul the man you thought he would be when you first saw him at 7 years old? John? Bruce? Are Jackie, Lynn, Sue or Suzie the essential women? The premise has to do with early childhood education, and the fact that, by the time they are 7 years old, we have had our shot at forming our children's characters, so we better not put it off. It seems to me that it is essentially true, with variations. The incremental interviews show us that kids will definitely go through developmental stages, but the basic character is there. What is sad is the judgments implied, which is unfair to these good people, chosen as children and yet they still allow us a glimpse of their lives every 7 years. Personally, I am grateful to them. I cheer for their ups, and sympathize with their set-backs. I am as proud of Paul's or Tony's accomplishments as I am of John's or Andrew's. And then there's Nick...! How great to claim him as a near-American! I could go on...but our personal response to any of them is a side-issue. I love them all, and I miss Peter and Charles very much.

...the "Up" series, or "The Up Series," or whatever you wish to call it, is not only Michael "Gorillas in the Mist" Apted's lifework, his calling card of calling cards, it's also one of the greatest documentaries produced so far. Nothing like it had come before, and all those after are but reiterations of a theme, perhaps worthy in their own right, but unlikely to outshine the progenitor of the form.Said form is multiple life histories at seven-year intervals: in this instance, fourteen British children (now reduced to twelve and possibly declining in future installments), all of whom are (as of this chapter, 2005) in their late-40s, heading into their 50s. The next meeting of the minds, so to speak, will hopefully come to pass before the supposed Mayan end of the world. I have no doubt it will be as thought-provoking and entertaining as the rest.That the series is utilized in various academic circles goes without saying; it's a time machine, a remarkably honest window on the past half-century of Western civilization, British style. Its sociological value is enormous, and it has spawned a number of similar projects examining German, Russian, American, and other populations. I hope they all have extremely long runs.Enough of the blather you'll read in any standard review of this series. What did *I* think? Well, I found it to be pretty damn fascinating. Had at best heard of it peripherally until I saw a recommendation recently from a source I respect, and so ordered up the whole ball of wax from the local library (yes, folks, your library is one of the best values your tax dollar has to pay for!), and watched it start to finish over the course of several weeks. The drawback to viewing the series in this manner is the amount of repetition of "flashback" sequences in each person's revealed timeline; occasionally it's irksome. But you come to accept the necessity of it, given the nature of the project. I suspect the series is of more interest to an older cohort for obvious reasons, which is not to say the young can't profit from it, but they'll simply have a more difficult time empathizing with it to the fullest. A stop-motion picture of aging will always appeal more to those who've been along the same path than the ones who have yet to travel it. I found myself considering my own life as if I'd lived in similar fashion. That, and I noted how easily one is drawn into the progression of these dozen-odd lives. This is "real" Reality TV, not the crap that most of you reading this have come to endure as a staple of modern entertainment.All the subjects of "The Up Series" are interesting, each in their own way, but you find yourself drawn to favorites. No doubt this is unordinary, since even Apted admits, in how he structures the later episodes, that some are more popular than others. One even wonders how this structuring itself somehow affects the viewer's perceptions of the individual; no doubt theses are being writ even as I type. Taken in large doses or small, "The Up Series" will exercise your brain and your heart, and if nothing else leave you with a better understanding of just how alike all members of the human family really are.

I grew up in England, and saw the first documentary there. I emigrated to Canada at 18, and have seen the rest of the series here. It has been both an opportunity to see how England and the English have changed, as well as seeing "old friends" every seven years. I grew up in a Navy family,we were not wealthy, but because my father was a Naval Officer, we were considered upper middle class, so I rode horses, went to the Continent on Holiday and and attended boarding school from age 10. I also attended a 1 room schoolhouse and changed primary schools with alarming rapidity, so I met many kids just like all the ones on 7-UP, I could even understand Nick's Yorkshire accent! My favorite is also Bruce, but I love Tony, Neil and Symon, and can totally empathise with Suzy! Funny how so many of the kids had broken childhoods, but became wonderful parents themselves. I am looking forward to catching up with them at 56!

This is not a social science film and it's not exactly an art film either. But neither is it just another version of Big Brother. I personally found this unique project profoundly moving in its originality. Through this film we get a deep sense of the way humans adjust to their circumstances, maintain their personalities and shape their own lives around what they want and can have. I had a sense of the innate decency of most human beings, our capacity for love and survival, the way in which character runs deeper than circumstances, but also the strong effect that circumstances such as the class one is born into can have on us. Most of all I was touched by the unpredictability of life: it would have been hard to say whose marriages would last and whose would not, for example.Having said that, it is unclear to me why so many of the subjects, who volunteer to take part in the filming, seem to fear and oppose it so much. As someone who would have loved the opportunity to revisit my own life at different stages, I have a hard time understanding the reasons for their reluctance and even hostility.