7 Plus Seven

Continuing the stories, more interesting as the the children are in their early teens. The little shitty rich kids are the worst.

This includes most of 'Seven Up' - the most important parts, anyway - so you might as well begin here. The keyword is juxtaposition. It's fascinating to compare the subjects, with each other and with themselves 7 years previously.

Oh Suzy, you racist.

I'm still not terribly impressed, but still hopeful for the later films. There's not a whole lot of progression from the first movie. One of the prissy prep boys is turning into a huge git, it's interesting to hear the three girls compare and contrast their different schools, one kid moved to Australia. But things are pretty much the same. There aren't many surprises here. I suspect that events become more compelling in the next film, as the kids start making more decisions for themselves.

I'm rating all of these a 90 because I see the experiment as valuable. These are normal people, for the most part, and some are interesting, some are not. Some of them have very bad problems, some don't. The prejudice of the film-maker is obvious, but what captivated me was whether or not we come to know these children, and later adults? I think we do, better than we ever will know Tom Cruise or Lindsay Lohan, no matter how many films they make. For that, for the depth of information, it's a 90.

Entertaining catch-up feels more like a middling current affairs segment than a film in of itself, and suffers from too much repetition of SEVEN UP's footage; still these are sparky, charismatic kids and the peek this film provides into 60s styles, society and attitudes is quite interesting and revealing.

Missed out on this one on my first Up Series go-round. I figured I wasn't missing much since the flashbacks from 7 Plus Seven were few and far between, but it seems I've been happily mistaken. It's not as quotable as the first installment, but its content is the whole point of the project. Watching real people evolve like this is very fascinating.

The series is yet to become brilliant at this point because, well, teenagers are usually very boring and here we see these kids are no exception to the rule.

Occasionally unfocused but a very interesting glimpse at adolescence. At times it does feel like the editing is constructed to make certain contrasts stand out, but on the whole it feels rather honest and provides a lot of food for thought about both youth and class issues.

I feel that neither the kids nor the films have gained enough perspective at this point to be really meaningful. However, I see where the series is going, and I'm looking forward to the rest.

At only fourteen years old these kids still have ill informed opinions and have yet to make any real life decisions. It's interesting to see them take a step in growing up, but this only promises more interesting changes in the future.

Slightly better than Seven Up!, but I'm looking forward to the films where there's much more points of reference to contrast the interviews with. Seven Up! got kind of boring since you were just talking to children. 7 Plus Seven is slightly more interesting, but I mean you're still just talking to teenagers. It can only get better from here, once we have more than one film to look back on.

Narrator: "Are you happier now than you were then?"

Intriguing to no end. Some real opinions are presented now. "The Up Series" concept is a thought provoking look at the social structure.

While this instalment was both interesting and well done, I have found this series less and less appealing as time has progressed. The initial concept seems somewhat to have been sacrificed, and the longer it goes on, the more it becomes a soap opera involving real lives. Summary of scores: 21 (60); 28 UP (55); 35 UP (50); 42 UP (45); 49 UP (40). Also, cf., my review of 49 UP.

An enormous downgrade over the first edition: The interview questions are hamfisted, the filmmaking itself is poor, and worst, the film doesn't address what it means to be 14, choosing instead to demonstrate how its subjects "show the man" of who they were at 7.

By the second installment, I've already come to realize that the whole will be greater than the sum of its parts in Michael Apted's Up series. Taken individually, each installment doesn't offer much, but the totality of the experiment is gratifying in a way few films are.

No one has anything interesting or even mildly entertaining to say when they're 14.

Better than the first, and a good sign of things to come for when they actually hit adulthood. It will make the first two films much more interesting to look back on.

x2

It was a good documentry, and the next few in the series should be interesting.

While in and of itself a very good documentary, it's damaged by the lack of change which surrounds most of the children. While the difference between 7 and 14 is vast at the time, even the film seems to recognize that most of the children have followed along very predictable paths, with the exception of one moving to Australia. 7 is more interesting as a snapshot into 60s Britain, and the participants come into their own in 21 Up! This is perhaps one that could be missed if need be.

Fascinating glimpse into those original kids who are now awkward little teenagers who definitely don't smile as much as they did when they were 7. I love that they have to watch clips of themselves at 7 and reassess their viewpoints.

"The flashbacking technique employed throughout the Up series is part of each film's dialectic approach and is alternately compelling and cumbersome." - Ed Gonzalez

Amazing.

For me, the least interesting of the series, likely because of the painful and at times crippling self-awareness of the adolescents on the screen.

A nice follow-up to 7 Up. The kids are now 14 and have minds of their own. This whole series is very addicting.