Paul Almond Movies

In this drama, an avaricious city boy leaves his LA home to meet his estranged father on the family homestead in Quebec. They have both inherited the land from a recently deceased uncle. The father has stayed close to his rural roots and cannot understand why his son is so indifferent to his inheritance that he wants to sell it and return to the city with his profits. A conflict ensues, and eventually, the young man begins to appreciate the land. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this complex spy caper, Nicole (Genevieve Bujold) is a Canadian broadcast journalist working on assignment in the former U.S.S.R. She is there to cover a visit by the Canadian prime minister, but along the way she discovers an unethical experimentation on children involving the use of steroids. She is also involved in smuggling out a girl for emergency brain surgery and develops a romantic liaison with Lyosha (Michael York), a bureaucrat in the Soviet press corps. A Jewish businessman she knows just happens to be in Russia, and she asks him to help her in the smuggling attempt. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A woman is led to the edge of madness as she wrestles between her spiritual life and her romantic longings in this unusual drama. Martha Hayes (Genevieve Bujold) is a young woman who was raised in a small rural community. A deeply committed Christian, Hayes moves to Montreal, where she earns a meager wage working with the choir at an Anglican Church. Hayes has also been asked to look after a child with health problems, and when the child unexpectedly dies, she falls into a deep depression. While in conference with Father Michael Ferrier (Donald Sutherland), a priest who has come to her church as part of a interfaith music festival, Hayes breaks down and confesses her love for him. Ferrier responds by leaving the church to marry her; however, Ferrier is not well suited for life in the secular world, and their marriage soon collapses, leading Hayes to desperate measures. Genevieve Bujold's performance in Act Of The Heart earned her the Best Actress award at the 1970 Canadian Film Awards. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The British documentary Seven Up originated in 1963 as a 31-minute episode of the highly acclaimed Granada Television series World in Action. Acting upon the venerable Jesuit edict "Give me a child until he is seven, and I will give you the man," director Paul Almond and his young team of assistants randomly selected a group "typical" seven-year-old British children from the ranks of the private-school system. In various locations and situations, the filmmakers interviewed the kids about their backgrounds, their present lives, and their hopes and dreams for the future. Of the interviewees -- ten boys (one of them black), four girls -- six were drawn from the financially strapped working class, four from the privileged upper class, and four from what was vaguely defined as British middle class. Not surprisingly, the upper-class youngters are already reading all the "right" newspapers, carefully plotting out their adult careers, and generally behaving in a patronizing manner to their interviewers. Of the working-class youngsters, East Ender Tony seems to have the clearest vision of what he wanted to do with his life; he intends to be a professional jockey, and is eager and willing to work up the ranks in pursuit of that goal. Viewers who tuned in back in 1963 were most affected by the story of middle-class youngsters Nick, Bruce, and especially Neil, a lonely, sickly looking Liverpudlian lad who aspires to be a tour-bus driver. Intended as a one-shot project, Seven Up took on a life of its own when one of Paul Almond's assistants, 22-year-old Michael Apted, thought it would be fascinating to keep tabs on the 14 children and update their stories at seven-year intervals. With this in mind, Apted -- becoming a full-fledged director himself -- rounded up the kids in 1970 for a follow-up TV documentary, Seven Plus Seven. Thus began what amount to a lifelong creative mission for Michael Apted, yielding such fascinating, and, at times, heartrending filmed studies as 21 Up (1977), 28 Up (1984), 35 Up (1991), and 42 Up (1998). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A business partner, desperate to milk some kind of profit from his failing cosmetics business, turns to arson with deadly results when he inadvertently immolates his partner while trying to destroy the factory. Still he succeeds in getting the insurance money. He then gets greedy and decides to do the same thing to his late partner's lovely daughter. Fortunately, an intrepid insurance investigator is on the case. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Heavily in debt, John Manbridge (Denholm Elliott) cannot wait to inherit the money promised him by his wealthy uncle Felix (Torin Thatcher). Hoping to speed up the process, John kills Uncle Felix, and then arranges a "perfect alibi." Only when Felix's body is found does John discover that the murder was entirely unnecessary -- but by then, he too has suffered his uncle's curious fate. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide