Cinema: Lives of Mannerly Desperation

/ "Give me a child when he is seven," Michael Apted might say, "and he's mine for life." In 1963 Apted, later a movie director (Gorillas in the Mist) but then a researcher for Granada TV, helped corral 10 British seven-year-olds and expose their elfin dreams and class prejudices in interviews for the documentary 7 Up. Every seven years since, he has returned to see how his young charges are faring. This time, in 35 UP, they are mostly a dour lot, soldiering edgily on, recounting their promotions and sackings, their new children and divorces. The trio of public school twits,...

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