On our second try last week, we got in to see 56 Up, the latest installment in the series that might be my favorite thing ever produced by the film industry, at the IFC Center on Sixth Avenue. That the film is only playing in one NYC theater, with only one screening nightly, suggests either severe oversight or unknown logistical barriers, seeing that it sold out on both a Saturday and Tuesday night.
THE TRAILER FOR 56 UP IS OUT!
This is the next in the Up Series, one of the most stunning, touching, revelatory achievements in the history of film-making.
For those who don’t know, the film series started in 1964, when the BBC broadcast a strange documentary featuring 14 seven-year-olds from across the English social strata. Originally meant as a one-off examination of England’s class system via the lives of children affected by it, it evolved into a series that revisits the original subjects every seven years. This year, they all turned 56.
The influence of class remains, but is eclipsed eventually by the prosaic, profound events that define each life. The peculiarities and universalities within each character leave me, every time, a little bit unhinged.
Chills and welled-up eyes.
I'm Sarah Stodola, the author of Process: The Writing Lives of Great Authors (Summer 2014). 