Documentary
Years

Popular Documentary Movies

Stop Making Sense
Stop Making Sense
A concert film documenting Talking Heads at the height of their popularity, on tour for their 1983 album "Speaking in Tongues." The band takes the stage one by one and is joined by a cadre of guest musicians for a career-spanning and cinematic performance that features creative choreography and visuals.
Stop Making Sense 2023
Häxan
Häxan
Grave robbing, torture, possessed nuns, and a satanic Sabbath: Benjamin Christensen's legendary film uses a series of dramatic vignettes to explore the scientific hypothesis that the witches of the Middle Ages suffered the same hysteria as turn-of-the-century psychiatric patients. But the film itself is far from serious-- instead it's a witches' brew of the scary, gross, and darkly humorous.
Häxan 1922
Home
Home
In 200,000 years of existence, man has upset the balance on which the Earth had lived for 4 billion years. Global warming, resource depletion, species extinction: man has endangered his own home. But it is too late to be pessimistic: humanity has barely ten years left to reverse the trend, become aware of its excessive exploitation of the Earth's riches, and change its consumption pattern.
Home 2009
Man on Wire
Man on Wire
On August 7th 1974, French tightrope walker Philippe Petit stepped out on a high wire, illegally rigged between New York's World Trade Center twin towers, then the world's tallest buildings. After nearly an hour of performing on the wire, 1,350 feet above the sidewalks of Manhattan, he was arrested. This fun and spellbinding documentary chronicles Philippe Petit's "highest" achievement.
Man on Wire 2008
The Salt of the Earth
The Salt of the Earth
During the last forty years, the photographer Sebastião Salgado has been travelling through the continents, in the footsteps of an ever-changing humanity. He has witnessed the major events of our recent history: international conflicts, starvations and exodus… He is now embarking on the discovery of pristine territories, of the wild fauna and flora, of grandiose landscapes: a huge photographic project which is a tribute to the planet's beauty. Salgado's life and work are revealed to us by his son, Juliano, who went with him during his last journeys, and by Wim Wenders, a photographer himself.
The Salt of the Earth 2014
Man with a Movie Camera
Man with a Movie Camera
A cameraman wanders around with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling inventiveness.
Man with a Movie Camera 1929
Shoah
Shoah
Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories – survivors, bystanders, and perpetrators – Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee, and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.
Shoah 1985
5 Broken Cameras
5 Broken Cameras
Five broken cameras – and each one has a powerful tale to tell. Embedded in the bullet-ridden remains of digital technology is the story of Emad Burnat, a farmer from the Palestinian village of Bil’in, which famously chose nonviolent resistance when the Israeli army encroached upon its land to make room for Jewish colonists. Emad buys his first camera in 2005 to document the birth of his fourth son, Gibreel. Over the course of the film, he becomes the peaceful archivist of an escalating struggle as olive trees are bulldozed, lives are lost, and a wall is built to segregate burgeoning Israeli settlements.
5 Broken Cameras 2012
Buena Vista Social Club
Buena Vista Social Club
In this fascinating Oscar-nominated documentary, American guitarist Ry Cooder brings together a group of legendary Cuban folk musicians (some in their 90s) to record a Grammy-winning CD in their native city of Havana. The result is a spectacular compilation of concert footage from the group's gigs in Amsterdam and New York City's famed Carnegie Hall, with director Wim Wenders capturing not only the music -- but also the musicians' life stories.
Buena Vista Social Club 1999
The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On
The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On
Kenzo Okuzaki, a 62-year-old veteran of the New Guinea campaign in World War II, sets out to conduct interviews with survivors and relatives to find the truth behind atrocities committed while the Japanese garrison was surrounded, in particular the unexplained killing of two Japanese privates in his unit.
The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On 1987
Sympathy for the Devil
Sympathy for the Devil
An exhilarating, provocative motion picture. The Rolling Stones rehearse their latest song, "Sympathy For the Devil," in a London studio. Beginning as a ballad, the track gradually acquires a pulsating groove, which gets Jagger into a rousing vocal display of soulful emotion that Godard captures on film.
Sympathy for the Devil 1969
Pina
Pina
Pina is a feature-length dance film in 3D with the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, featuring the unique and inspiring art of the great German choreographer, who died in the summer of 2009.
Pina 2011
A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies
A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies
Martin Scorsese celebrates American movies from the silent classics to the Hollywood of the seventies.
A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies 1995
The Gleaners and I
The Gleaners and I
Varda focuses her eye on gleaners: those who scour already-reaped fields for the odd potato or turnip. Her investigation leads from forgotten corners of the French countryside to off-hours at the green markets of Paris, following those who insist on finding a use for that which society has cast off, whether out of necessity or activism.
The Gleaners and I 2000
Varda by Agnès
Varda by Agnès
An unpredictable documentary from a fascinating storyteller, Agnès Varda’s last film sheds light on her experience as a director, bringing a personal insight to what she calls "cine-writing," traveling from Rue Daguerre in Paris to Los Angeles and Beijing.
Varda by Agnès 2019
Room 237
Room 237
A subjective documentary that explores various theories about hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's classic film The Shining. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice over, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments.
Room 237 2013
Tokyo-Ga
Tokyo-Ga
German director Wim Wenders made this documentary in which he tries to explore the Tokyo that was depicted in the films of Yasujiro Ozu. When Wenders visits Tokyo for the first time, he finds a very different city, one with a booming fascination with technology that often clashes with the traditional elements of Japanese culture. Wenders also interviews Ozu's cinematographer, Yuharu Atsuta, and Chishu Ryu, an actor who frequently collaborated with Ozu.
Tokyo-Ga 1985
Why We Fight
Why We Fight
Is American foreign policy dominated by the idea of military supremacy? Has the military become too important in American life? Jarecki's shrewd and intelligent polemic would seem to give an affirmative answer to each of these questions.
Why We Fight 2005
Mysterious Object at Noon
Mysterious Object at Noon
A camera crew travels through Thailand asking villagers to invent the next chapter of an ever-growing story. A TV-obsessed boxer, a group of schoolkids, a lonely rubber-tree tapper and feuding food vendors all add to a tale that includes witches, tigers, surprise doublings, and impossible reversals.
Mysterious Object at Noon 2001
Mifune: The Last Samurai
Mifune: The Last Samurai
An account of the life and work of legendary Japanese actor Toshirō Mifune (1920-97), the most prominent actor of the Golden Age of Japanese cinema.
Mifune: The Last Samurai 2016
Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power
Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power
Investigates the politics of cinematic shot design, and how this meta-level of filmmaking intersects with the twin epidemics of sexual abuse/assault and employment discrimination against women, with over 80 movie clips from 1896 - 2020.
Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power 2022
Orion: The Man Who Would Be King
Orion: The Man Who Would Be King
August 16, 1977. All of America was stunned by the news of Elvis Presley's untimely passing. Some went so far as to believe that it couldn't be true. Somehow he had faked his death. For the executives at Sun Records that fantasy became an opportunity in the form of Orion, a mysterious masked performer with the voice of The King. First appearing in 1979, Orion recorded 11 albums and performed live to packed houses and rapturous fans around the nation. But who was the man behind the mask? In this stranger-than-fiction true story, Jeanie Finlay exposes the incredible life of an unknown singer plucked from obscurity and thrust into the spotlight with the complicity of a manipulative music industry and a public fan base unwilling to let The King go. Resonant in its themes of identity, fate, and the double-edged nature of fame, Orion is a stylish mystery story that finally gives a name and a face to a gifted artist who had been unjustly deprived of both.
Orion: The Man Who Would Be King 2015
Land of Silence and Darkness
Land of Silence and Darkness
Through examining Fini Straubinger, an old woman who has been deaf and blind since her teens, and her work on behalf of other deaf-blind people, this film shows how the deaf-blind struggle to understand and accept a world from which they are almost wholly isolated.
Land of Silence and Darkness 1971
Night Will Fall
Night Will Fall
When Allied forces liberated the Nazi concentration camps in 1944-45, their terrible discoveries were recorded by army and newsreel cameramen, revealing for the first time the full horror of what had happened. Making use of British, Soviet and American footage, the Ministry of Information’s Sidney Bernstein (later founder of Granada Television) aimed to create a documentary that would provide lasting, undeniable evidence of the Nazis’ unspeakable crimes. He commissioned a wealth of British talent, including editor Stewart McAllister, writer and future cabinet minister Richard Crossman – and, as treatment advisor, his friend Alfred Hitchcock. Yet, despite initial support from the British and US Governments, the film was shelved, and only now, 70 years on, has it been restored and completed by Imperial War Museums under its original title "German Concentration Camps Factual Survey".
Night Will Fall 2014
I Am Divine
I Am Divine
Harris Glenn Milstead, aka Divine (1945-1988) was the ultimate outsider turned underground hero. Spitting in the face of the status quos of body image, gender identity, sexuality, and preconceived notions of beauty, Divine succeeded in becoming an internationally recognized icon, recording artist, and character actor of stage and screen. Glenn went from the often-mocked, schoolyard fat kid to underdog royalty, standing up for millions of gay men and women, drag queens and punk rockers, and countless other socially ostracized misfits and freaks. With a completely committed in-your-face style, he blurred the line between performer and personality, and revolutionized pop culture.
I Am Divine 2013
The Pearl Button
The Pearl Button
The ocean contains the history of all humanity. The sea holds all the voices of the earth and those that come from outer space. Water receives impetus from the stars and transmits it to living creatures. Water, the longest border in Chile, also holds the secret of two mysterious buttons which were found on its ocean floor. Chile, with its 2,670 miles of coastline and the largest archipelago in the world, presents a supernatural landscape. In it are volcanoes, mountains and glaciers. In it are the voices of the Patagonian Indigenous people, the first English sailors and also those of its political prisoners. Some say that water has memory. This film shows that it also has a voice.
The Pearl Button 2015
Welcome to Leith
Welcome to Leith
In September 2012, the tiny prairie town of Leith, North Dakota, sees its population of 24 grow by one. As the new resident's behavior becomes more threatening, tensions soar, and the residents desperately look for ways to expel their unwanted neighbor.
Welcome to Leith 2015
Polaris
Polaris
Hayat, an expert sailor in the Arctic, navigates far from humans and her family's past in France. But when her little sister Leila gives birth to a baby girl Inaya, their worlds are turned upside down; we witness their journey, guided by the polar star, to overcome the family’s fate.
Polaris 2023
The Monopoly of Violence
The Monopoly of Violence
As anger and resentment grow in the face of social inequalities, many citizens-led protests are being repressed with an ever-increasing violence. In this documentary, David Dufresne gathers a panel of citizens to question, exchange and confront their views on the social order and the legitimacy of the use of force by the State.
The Monopoly of Violence 2020
Room 666
Room 666
During the 1982 Cannes Film Festival, Wenders asks a number of global film directors to, one at a time, go into a hotel room, turn on the camera and answer a simple question: "What is the future of cinema?"
Room 666 1982
The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner
The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner
A study of the psychology of a champion ski-flyer, whose full-time occupation is carpentry.
The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner 1974
News from Home
News from Home
Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman lives in New York. Filmed images of the City accompany texts of Akerman's loving mother back home in Brussels. The City comes more and more to the front while the words of the mother, read by Akerman herself, gradually fade away.
News from Home 1977
The Great White Silence
The Great White Silence
Herbert Ponting travelled to Antarctica as part of Captain Scott's ill-fated South pole expedition and shot the footage that makes up this extraordinary documentary.
The Great White Silence 1922
Loving Highsmith
Loving Highsmith
The story of the life, loves and work of US writer Patricia Highsmith (1921-95), told through her unpublished diaries, her own voice and that of those who knew her, both family and close friends.
Loving Highsmith 2022
Name Me Lawand
Name Me Lawand
Void of any language, communication or true sense of self, Lawand struggles to piece together his surroundings in his new home in Yorkshire, England after a traumatic and turbulent year of seeking asylum through Europe.
Name Me Lawand 2023
Jane B. for Agnès V.
Jane B. for Agnès V.
The interests, obsessions, and fantasies of two singular artists converge in this inspired collaboration between Agnès Varda and her longtime friend the actor Jane Birkin. Made over the course of a year and motivated by Birkin’s fortieth birthday—a milestone she admits to some anxiety over—Jane B. by Agnès V. contrasts the private, reflective Birkin with Birkin the icon.
Jane B. for Agnès V. 1988
Dreams of a Life
Dreams of a Life
A filmmaker sets out to discover the life of Joyce Vincent, who died in her bedsit in North London in 2003. Her body wasn't discovered for three years, and newspaper reports offered few details of her life - not even a photograph.
Dreams of a Life 2011
My Voyage to Italy
My Voyage to Italy
World-renowned director Martin Scorsese narrates this journey through his favorites in Italian cinema.
My Voyage to Italy 1999
London
London
A psycho-geographic journey through London and its history, as undertaken by an unseen narrator and his companion, Robinson, at the time of the 1992 general election.
London 1994
Interior. Leather Bar.
Interior. Leather Bar.
Filmmakers James Franco and Travis Mathews re-imagine the lost 40 minutes from "Cruising" as a starting point to a broader exploration of sexual and creative freedom.
Interior. Leather Bar. 2013
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