Michael Apted, the British film director with an elastic approach to form and genre, has died according to reports. His work began in British television then expanded into award-winning Hollywood features and prestige cable dramas. He was also the principal engine behind the celebrated Up documentary series, which sits in a class by itself in terms of directorial endurance and emotional impact. He was 79 years old.
Apted was in his early 20s and working at Grenada Television when he was tasked with finding 14 seven-year-olds across the spectrum of British society who might be suitable for a documentary portrait. The result was Seven Up, a 1964 film directed by Paul Almond. It laid the groundwork for the nine films in the legendary Up series.
After a time in the director’s chair, including on shows like Coronation Street, Apted returned to the Up project as the kids turned 14, this time at the helm. This continued every seven years until 2019, with 63 Up. Roger Ebert, at one time, referred to the series as “the noblest project in cinema history.”
After the successful British rocker flick Stardust, the Vanessa Redgrave-led conjecture-heavy Agatha Christie film Agatha, and the third in the Up series, Apted hit the ground running in Hollywood. Coal Miner’s Daughter, released in 1980, revolutionized the musical biopic, peeling back the curtain on success, looking at Loretta Lynn‘s roots and troubled relationship with her manager/husband. Sissy Spacek, who somehow could pass for 13 at the age of 30, won the Academy Award for best actress. Tommy Lee Jones, Levon Helm, and Beverly D’Angelo co-starred as Lynn’s husband Doolitte, her father, and her mentor Patsy Cline.
Apted followed-up Coal Miner’s Daughter with the successful film Continental Divide, which positioned John Belushi as a romantic comedy lead. (Belushi died shortly after the movie’s release.) In 1983 he released Gorky Park, a mystery-thriller set in Russia which, considering the Cold War era, was something of a big deal. The 1980s also saw the Richard Pryor medical comedy Critical Condition and Sigourney Weaver as primatologist Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist. (Weaver was nominated for a best actress Oscar, but did not win.)
In addition to 28 Up, Apted also directed the documentary Bring on the Night, which focused on Sting forming his new band after leaving The Police. It’s one of the finest music docs ever, following the creation of a sound from vague notions through to a recording and, finally, a triumphant opening night concert.
In the early 1990s Apted directed two projects about American Indians. Thunderheart, loosely based on the 1973 Wounded Knee incident, starred Val Kilmer, Sam Shepard, and Graham Greene. Incident at Oglala, released just two months later though a different studio (flex!), is a documentary about Leonard Peltier, an American Indian activist who has been imprisoned since 1975 on what many believe are false charges.