Hacker Cinema
Seven Up!
1985 · Film · documentary · 40 min
Part of The Up Collection
Directed by Paul Almond
A group of British children aged 7 from widely ranging backgrounds are interviewed about a range of subjects. The filmmakers plan to re-interview them at 7 year intervals to track how their lives and attitudes change as they age.
3 positive1 mixed1 neutralfrom 5 commenters
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Here is the list from the thread: --- 1. A Man Named Pearl
2. Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland
3. Microcosmos
4. Crip Camp!
5. Keep The River On Your Right
6. All The Beauty And The Bloodshed
7. Harlan County USA
8. Stay on Board: The Leo Baker Story
9. Good Night Oppy
10. We Met in Virtual Reality
11. All That Breathes
12. Still
13. Can’t Be Stopped
14. The Amazing Jonathan Documentary
15. Searching for Sugarman
16. AKA Mr Chow
17. The Pigeon Tunnel
18. Little Richard: I Am Everything
19. I Know That Voice
20. Genghis Blues
21. Kings of Pastry
22. 20 Feet From Stardom
23. Stevie
24. Anvil: the Story of Anvil
25. Searching for Sugar Man
26. King of Kong
27. The Gleaners and I
28. Touching the Void
29. Cane Toads: An Unnatural History
30. 20 Days in Mariupol
31. Minding the Gap
32. How to Survive a Plague
33. Speciesism
34. Free Solo
35. Jim Allison: Breakthrough
36. Seven Up! series
37. Bowling for Columbine
38. The Fog of War
39. Rivers and Tides
40. Capturing the Friedmans
41. Spellbound
42. King of Kong
43. Crip Camp
44. Jesus Camp
45. Jiro Dreams of Sushi
46. Flee
47. Man on Wire
48. Queen of Versailles
49. The Thin Blue Line
50. Time Indefinite
51. The Gleaners and I
52. My Life as a Turkey
53. Happy People
54. Grizzly Man
I was a huge fan of the Seven Up series when I was introduced to it in the mid 2000s and watched the latest 63 Up. However, with the advent of social media, his series seems like a dinosaur. The public can directly follow people on a day to day basis and there really is no place or need for his documentary. The subjects themselves can now reach the public directly if they want to.
There could still be reasons for picking such a sample.
1) In the far future, when most direct hardships are a thing of the past our lives probably resemble those of Harvard students more, than those of a random population sample in the 1930's
2) It is relatively easy to think of things that may make poor, disadvantaged, discriminated against, etc. people unhappy. And there is some data on this. While it was/is less clear for the advantaged.
3) Mentioned elsewhere, a study can gain discerning power if variables that vary a lot are kept constant. Similarly to how when doing a scientific experiment, one wants to control most variables besides the one one wants to test (simply makes the study more narrow, but deeper).
4) Practically speaking, a lot of psychological research is done on students, simply because they are within easy reach for scholars. Why Harvard students? Because that's a place where they would embark on something long-term like this 70 years ago.
5) More cynically, the scholars behind the study, and even after 70 years still the most powerful social demographic group, and probably a large portion of the most well-read, are in the sample they picked. So they sort of wanted to scratch their own itch first...
Finally, see the lovely series 7UP for a more random sample (allbeit much smaller, and British...)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058578/
"Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117293/
A group of young men are accused of murder because, basically, they look like goths and have the misfortune of living in a conservative Christian community.
---
The "Seven Up" series:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058578/
A group of British kids from various socio-economic backgrounds are interviewed starting when they are 7 years old, and interviewed again every 7 years.
---
"Manufacturing Consent"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104810/
Based on Noam Chomsky's book about the influence the mass media and other institutions have on Americans.
---
"Crumb"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109508/
The life of Robert Crumb, a hugely influential underground cartoonist.
---
"Born Rich"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/
About kids who are born in to insanely wealthy families.
I recommend everyone see the Seven Up series (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Up!) as it is one of the best documentaries ever made. In it, Michael Apted interviews a group of British children from a variety of backgrounds every 7 years, from the time they are 7 until (currently) they are 49.
It is quite striking to see how people change and progress as they age, and you can definitely see how little they change after their 20s in the series.