Fergus McDonell was one of five children born to Angus MacDonnell, Judge of Trichonopoly, Madras and his wife Elsie Murdoch.
As was the custom among members of the Indian Civil Service during the Raj, it is likely that McDonell spent his early childhood in India and was sent back to England for his education.
Chibnall and McFarlane praise McDonell's "sensitive regard for human relationships and for the ways in which the pressure of circumstance highlights aspects of character", and they note that he "had a knack for obtaining striking performances from his leading ladies".
He was simultaneously working on four episodes of a 12-film psychiatric series by his NFB colleague Robert Anderson called The Disordered Mind, which would also air on the CBC.
He made two additional psychiatric films for Anderson and Geigy Pharmaceuticals, returned to the NFB as editor on two documentaries and, in 1961, moved back to England.
That was followed by, among others, The Caretaker, 1965's Four in the Morning (which would win Judi Dench the 1966 BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer), Stephen Frears first film Gumshoe (1971) and the critically acclaimed Khartoum (1966).