(1984)
4.5
Derek Armstrong
With 28 Up, the fourth installment in the documentary series charting ordinary British citizens throughout their lives, director Michael Apted finds uncooperative behavior finally starting to claim some of his interview subjects. Two of the 14 children, who were first interviewed 21 years earlier, have opted out of the process, including the one who seemed the most burdened by the questioning in 21 Up. (Ironically, the two who might logically have discontinued the interviews -- having emigrated to Melbourne, Australia and Madison, Wisconsin -- are still participating). However, not everyone has taken a turn for the more exasperated, and in fact, it's extraordinary how much the right seven years can entirely adjust a personality. Suzanne Dewey, for example, predictably grew from a disgruntled, embarrassed 14-year-old into a chain-smoking, punkish 21-year-old with a pronounced distaste for marriage; by 28, however, she's smiling, married with kids, living in the countryside, and given to wearing dorky sweaters. Agreeable marriages have found a sizeable number of the participants, many of whom seem happy at best, happy-go-lucky at worst. One notable exception is Neil Hughes, who had gone off track from upward mobility in the previous episode, and by 1984 has literally become a vagabond, full of hard-knocks life experience, wisdom beyond his 28 years, and a strangely optimistic outlook despite his deep-seated melancholy. Apted spends the most time with Hughes, and it's a thoroughly engrossing section. What makes 28 Up a much stronger viewing experience than 21 Up is that Apted has finally learned to structure the material in user-friendly fashion. In previous Up movies, the disparate interviews were co-mingled, revisited, and blurred together. Here, he separates them, conducting an entire segment at once, then moving on to the next. It's much cleaner, plus it gives the viewer reliable progress benchmarks within the 136-minute running time.
28 Up on AllMovie
28 Up (1984)
