It started in 1964 with "Seven Up!," a 40-minute British TV special in which more than a dozen 7-year-old children -- all from diverse backgrounds -- gave spontaneous responses to questions about their lives, hopes and expectations for the future. In keeping with the show's theme -- "Give me the child until he is 7, and I will give you the man" -- filmmaker Michael Apted decided to continue filming those children thereafter in seven-year installments.

Well, guess what: Those adorable kids just turned 49. And in "49 Up," Apted (who turned 65 this year) shows us just how far they've come and yet how much they are the same. The divorces, the renewed partnerships, the new spouses, the way the children have grown, the plans for their second half-century -- these are the matters that now take the attention of our ever-aging subjects.

There's Tony, the cockney former jockey, now a grandparent and ready to settle in Spain. And Bruce the bachelor and math teacher who finally got married in "42 Up." Now he's reading bedtime stories to his children. Fatherhood at any age, he discovers, is tiring. Sue, a sunny personality, has indeed found the love that, in "42 Up," she was hoping for with Glen. Jackie, who hopes to return to school so she can "hold a conversation with anyone in the world," castigates Apted for doubting her potential.

"I'm more intelligent than you thought I would be," she tells him.

With this increasing accumulation of material, much of which has been processed and reprocessed before, the earlier films become passing glimpses now. Here's a brief statement they made at 7; and look at his hair when he was 28; and so forth. What "49 Up" shows is how the past is forever changing in its significance, its context. The more you watch, the more you are committing yourself to watching "56 Up" and beyond.

-- Desson Thomson (Oct. 5, 2006)

Contains profanity.