In the early 1960s, a group of Brits at Granada television came up with a then quite extraordinary idea: they would film the lives, thoughts and daily realities of a group of 14 seven year-olds. So was born the documentary series '7-Up', as made by Michael Apted.
As his starting point, Apted relied upon an old Jesuit saying, give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man. The programme's manifesto was simple: economic class determines future success. To test this claim, the same children would be filmed aged 14, then 21, then 28, 35, 42 and so on.
Despite the fact that the 14 children were chosen as a 'cross-section' of British society, there is only one non-white participant in 7-Up and there are only four women. When queried in recent years about this seeming imbalance, Apted stated: 'Honestly, it never occurred to us.' The Guardian has in turn pointed out that this is itself an interesting reflection of the way Britain saw itself as in 1964: essentially, as a white, male place.
When I first watched the 7-Up series in around 1991, I was 13 years old and I was transfixed. Somehow, this group of people has insinutated itself into my life over the years. Each time the seven year period rolls around, watching the 7-Uppers invariably reminds me of what I was doing seven years ago and how my life has variously changed or stayed the same. Watching those children morph from tykes rumbling in a playground in 1964 (replete with plummy English voice-over of the sort you might find on a nature documentary) to awkward adolescents and sometimes angry and uncomfortable adults in the 1990s and beyond has marked itself on my own mind, and is lodged in my consciousness of growing up.
49-Up had its first screening in the UK last night, and I eagerly await watching it here. That said, the series is not always easy viewing, and all the participants have said that they've felt deep anger at certain times towards the documentarian and his process. Interesting stuff.
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