The "Up" Series
November 14, 2004
There is worry and apprehension in Neil’s eyes, voice, and demeanor at 28. At 21, there was still some optimism, but not much. At 14 he was looking forward to Oxford, at 7 he was sprightly and animated, a little boy with messy hair who wanted to be an astronaut, and failing that, a country tour guide. At 35 we are concerned, the little boy of 7, then 14, the squatter of 21, homeless wanderer of 28, is now a nervous wreck, living in the British Shetland Islands, the town loser, surviving off of government stipends and toiling away with dreams of taking the local acting troupe on tour. Neil breaks our heart, but by the time filmmaker Michael Apted visits him again, aged to 42 years old, for his famous “Up” documentary series, a landmark that tracks the lives of 14 British children, of different classes, from age 7 up, most recently in 1998 as the participants are 42 going on middle age, Neil is doing okay. He still has a nervous twitch, and still dresses in shabby, worn down clothes; he still lives off of government handouts, and is still forever single (confidence is weary after the life he’s led), but the gloom he showed us at 21, and then even worse at 28, has worn off considerably (maybe with age comes optimism), and he is now living decently in London, an elected member of the Liberal Democratic party, and good friends with another participant from the film series.
The boy who wanted to be a tour guide at 7, but wound up homeless, pathetic, and estranged from his parents, has come through it with a positive outlook, and one of the truly remarkable things about the “Up” series, recently issued on DVD, is that, from film to film (six in all), 7 years to 14 years, to 21 years to 28, 35, and 42, we’re genuinely absorbed in the consequences of complete strangers. We watch Neil, the most fascinating of the group, we worry if he’ll even make 42, especially after 28, living in a shack in Scotland, with little prospects, and fewer hopes, and when he does, and seems well on his way to 49, and God willing, 56, and 63, we’re absolutely moved to tears. It’s not only triumphant to behold, but essentially self-revelatory to process- if I were homeless at 28, would I have the strength to chug through to 35? Neil is strong, the human spirit is willing, and what Apted’s experiment wants us to ask is, would we be up to such personal evaluation like Neil is every seven years, despite the circumstances. I’d like to think so, and I’d like to think my own 7’s would be as compelling as these are.
Neil isn’t the only great subject that Apted and his British television crew from “World in Action” first photographed, in black and white, as 7-year-olds in 1964, talking about their hopes, thoughts, loves, lives, classes, education systems, and general ambitions. There are 13 others, from different social classes, who all end up in wildly differing lives as they grow up before our eyes, some of whom drop out of the series for personal reasons, and some who come to shun every 7th year, though respectfully participate out of obligation to their loving director. We come to know and admire young Bruce, who wants to be a missionary at age 7, and grows up to be a math teacher at a Catholic girls school in London’s East End; Suzy, a privileged girl in a ballerina outfit at 7, grows up happily married with three kids, making a remarkable personality change from the cynical 21-year-old, a product of divorced parents, of 1978. There is Tony, who wants to be a jockey when he is a boy, achieves that goal, briefly, and grows up to become a cab driver, part time actor, and struggling family man. We’re sad when he breaks down on camera at 35, after the death of his mother, and astonished at 42, when he candidly admits his adultery to us, with his wife by his side. The little sparkplug of 7 has grown up into a man of complex emotions and needs, but didn’t his personality in 1964 suggest as much? There is still more, such as Simon, the only black kid of the group, lives in a boys home until he is 21, and then works hard his whole life without a father, until he himself is a grown man with six kids of his own. We marvel at the differences between the three rich boys, John, Andrew, and Charles, as they grow up and become successful, and the three East End working girls, Jackie, Lynn, and Sue, as they marry, divorce, procreate, lose parents, develop illnesses, and move on.
These people, strangers until 7, are ordinary citizens; you, me, your neighbor, my neighbor, but are bound forever by this incredible series, and as the years pass, the viewer- especially one who watches all six films in succession- comes to know, love, fear, and anticipate their existence, while wondering metaphysical questions about our own lives. Would we have Jackie’s resolve, raising three boys alone, with an increasingly painful arthritis condition? Or Nick’s courage, to leave the family farm, his elderly father and deaf brother, to study nuclear fusion in Wisconsin? What about John, the little snot of 7 and 14, who marries rich and declines to participate in the series after 35 because his agenda has been rightfully satisfied; would we hate him in real life like we’ve judged him based purely on film, just because he’s wealthy, went to Cambridge, and seems a tad snooty? The “Up” series is as epic as daily life itself, in its painstaking, generation spanning analysis of culture, society, politics, morals, and existence, seen through the eyes of 14 different personalities, rich and poor, male and female, shy and brash, it forms the genetics of the basic human condition; a sociological mapping of class structure and ideology unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. “Give me a child until he is seven,” says the narrator in every installment, “and I will give you the man.” The “Up” series is a masterpiece that gives us more than that; it gives us hope- hope for our futures, hope for humanity, and hope for mankind. Just look at our worrisome friend Neil, through the ages, and tell me there isn’t a bit of hope left for all of us.
The “Up” series has been released on DVD in a box set by First Run Features, and includes a commentary by director Michael Apted on “42 Up”.
by Adam Suraf