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This book is a study of documentary series such as Michael Apted's world-famous Seven Up films that set out to trace the life-journeys of individuals from their earliest schooldays till they are fully grown adults. In addition to Seven Up, the book provides extended accounts of the two other best known longitudinal series to have been produced in the last three or four decades. It includes Winifred and Barbara Junge's The Children of Golzow and Swedish director Rainer Hartleb's The Children of Jordbro. The book first examines some of the principal generic features of long docs and considers the highly significant role that particular institutions have had on their production, promotion and dissemination. It then explores a study of how the individual works originated, with a special emphasis on the nurturing role of particular institutions. The book also explores the affinities that long docs have with soap opera texts, which have similar aspirations to neverendingness. Both long docs and soaps rely on an episodic mode of delivery and both seek to persuade their audience that they are attempting to chronicle real-time developments. Finally, the book explores the variety of ways in which long doc filmmakers contrive to bring their work to a satisfactory conclusion.
far more important structural role than it does in soaps. Viewers, even as they are brought up to date with more recent events in a subject’s life, will know that they will soon be reacquainted with (in the sense of being shown) a series of defining moments from the earlier stages of that subject’s life. There is, in other words, a strong, generically determined expectation that the individual biographical accounts will include what Michael Apted has called those ‘golden highlights’ (Apted, 1998) – namely, a sequence of images that rapidly traces over a series of
and of different broadcasting or filmmaking traditions. Seven Up 1 The Seven Up series had its origins in May 1964 when Granada Television transmitted a one-off ‘special’ in their World in Action series. Granada was already making a reputation for itself as a company with a clear, left-leaning political agenda and World in Action was its flagship current affairs programme. Michael Apted, later to become director of the Seven Up series, had a relatively junior role to play in the making of this World in Action special. Having only joined Granada the previous year on a
it is most frequently compared, Apted’s Seven Up, Winfried Junge responded thus: ‘For someone who is interested in the sociological and psychological aspects of the children’s development, there are distinct advantages in Michael Apted’s approach’ (Junge, 2006). Junge went on to say that he thought Apted also had the advantage over him insofar as the latter’s more ‘economical’ approach had allowed his British ‘rival’ to develop two parallel filmmaking careers.7 As Junge somewhat ruefully observed: ‘If I had adopted the same approach, I too would have had the chance
also represent a serious attempt to explore the perceived significance of the series and, further, to reflect on the often not inconsiderable difficulties that filmmakers have confronted in the course of producing them.1 What is noticeable about many of these retrospective reflections is the extent to which the filmmakers concerned are ready to concede the number of mistakes they have made along the way. Michael Apted in particular, in the audio commentary he provides before each new ‘chapter’ of 42 Up, is very open about some of the problems he has had with several of his
which long docs originate, it goes without saying that, to be at all successful in the longer term, they require a special kind of nurturing. Not only does the film or programme maker have to make a long-term (sometimes life-long) commitment to the project; a long doc also needs the support of a broadcaster or sponsoring agent. Michael Apted, for instance, has always been keen to express his debt to Granada, not only for having been responsible for originating the series but also for having, over the years, continued to give the project its support. In his words: One
Introduction The origins of this book go back to the autumn of 2005 when I attended a joint presentation given by Michael Apted and Granada Television producer Jemma Jupp at the Sheffield International Documentary Film Festival. Apted had recently completed the seventh film (49 Up) in his well-known Seven Up series and used the occasion to reflect back on more than 40 years’ involvement in a project that is perhaps the best-known example of a ‘longitudinal documentary’ (which for the sake of brevity I shall from now on refer to as ‘long doc(s)’). In the course of
) and Midnight Express (1978), both of which saw the involvement of David Puttnam at the production stage. In this chapter I shall primarily explore two films that Puttnam produced during the 1970s – That’ll Be the Day (Claude Whatham, 1973) and Stardust (Michael Apted, 1974), and examine the ways in which they speak of a rich relationship that was developing between British film-making and music during the 1970s. Here is a nice bit of nostalgia: That’ll Be the Day David Puttnam and Ray Connolly were two kids born during the Second World War who, as adults in the 1970
Stephen Frears (Reisz’s assistant director on Morgan ) – many of these directors would probably have emerged, like Michael Apted, from regional television regardless of the mainstream success of their Free Cinema brethren. In any case, Reisz’s realism rapidly developed away from its kitchen sink roots into a more individual, hybrid style. This fused elements of naturalist mise-en-scène (through
investigation. Nevertheless, there is 192 Taking the long view often, as we have seen, a somewhat cat-and-mouse aspect to such relations between subject and filmmaker. Most filmmakers agree, when pressed, that they have had to devise particular strategies for getting subjects to articulate thoughts and feelings on camera. As Michael Apted has observed: ‘I’ve learned how to press people’s buttons … You kind of know how to wind them up’ (Apted, 1998). The enduring appeal of long docs In spite of some obvious differences between the long docs covered in this study, there are