The Greatest Documentaries Of All Time

[ThickAndCreamy]

Lately I've been binging on Attenborough and I've been thinking, what are the greatest documentaries of all time, whether film or television? This isn't a definitive list or top 100, just a general discussion of memorably astounding pieces of film.

What do you personally think makes the perfect documentary? An incredible scope? breathtaking cinematography? Truly era defining narrators? Or simply interviews with some of the most prolific views or understanding of certain subjects?

There are still many great documentaries I have yet to watch Civilization for example. They truly seem to be the least recognised and congratulated art form, which is very odd considering how grounded to reality they often are. Maybe escapism is overly dominate in the entertainment industry, which is honestly rather quite bleak. The firm harshness and knowledge of programs such as The World At War is so awe inspiring that it should be almost required viewing.

I'd like to start with an obvious favourite of mine.

Planet Earth
Truly the greatest nature documentary every recorded in terms of scale, beauty and the extremities it took to make. If I recall correctly they spent over 1 year searching in the Himalayas just to film a snow leopard. The sheer audacity of some of the filming techniques and sections of the documentary are also truly outstanding. The whole series is rather overwhelming in fact, and the narration by Attenborough just helps to make it the defining nature documentary of the 21st Century. It's incredibly bleak at points and cruel and constantly grounded to reality helping to add to the aura of sublime melancholy that emanates throughout the show. While Al Gore gives presentations on Global Warming, David manages to actually entertain and teach with an incredible amount of charisma and pure film.

[vrailaine]

Hoop Dreams and Man On Wire are both great, mainly because the topics are so interesting.

Every Errol Morris documentary I've watched(Thin Blue Line, Fog Of War, Vernon Florida, Gates of Heaven) has been brilliant too.

There was one out last year called "Dear Zachary" that was rather powerful, but was so heavily biased that I wouldn't really count it as a good documentary... Michael Moore would be in this category too.

Michael Apted's Up Series is only okay but I've seen it being called a masterpiece in place, the idea was great but the execution is poor and the format means there's some terminally boring people you've to endure in each one talking about how nothing has happened in 7 years.

EDIT-My favourite ever is Hearts of Darkness, wonderful execution, fascinating subject with an incredibly strong inside look at Coppola for the whole thing thanks to his wife recording him without permission.

[Starlit]

Death On The Staircase
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0388644/

It seems like more of a drama than a documentary, but it's just a camera crew following a case from just after the police were called to the verdict in court. Utterly gripping from start to finish, with plenty of twists that you wouldn't believe if they weren't true.

[Santa's Boyfriend]

One of the greatest documentaries of all time is, in my opinion, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.  It's the story of the military coup d'etat against Venezuela's Chavez government in 2002, and is filmed from inside the government itself by two Irish documentary film-makers who happened to be there at the time.  A really extraordinary story, and a real eye-opener regarding how Latin American politics works.  You won't find the film for sale anywhere due to some kind of complex rights issue*, but you can see it in its entirety on google video, here:

http://video.google.co.uk/googleplayer.swf?docid=5832390545689805144&hl=en&fs=true

I'd also really recommend 9-11, the documentary filmed by two French film-makers who happened to be making a film about New York Firefighters in September 11th 2001, and who end up filming the whole day from the point of view of the firefighters.


*Some believe its lack of availability to be somewhat political in nature, which wouldn't surprise me considering what the film implies regarding the Bush administration.  I have no idea myself.

[Serge]

'One Day In September', about the Munich Olympics massacre. Has the benefit of the fact that pretty much the entire thing was being filmed live. Is also obviously extremely depressing, but damn well made for all that.

'In The Shadow Of The Moon', interviewing most of the surviving astronauts who went to the moon - with one notable and fairly obvious exception - with footage of the expeditions that never ceases to be amazing, no matter how often you see it. An ideal companion to Andrew Smiths book 'Moondust' too.

'The Filth And The Fury' and 'Westway To The World', possibly my two favourite music documentaries of all time. The former has some of the greatest editing ever (which Temple repeated to much lesser effect in his 'Strummer' documentary, which is one of my least favourites) and the latter has some of the best interviews with The Clash I've ever heard.

[Starlit]

.....has some of the greatest editing ever

Can you elaborate as to what you mean by this? I can't really imagine what great editing in a documentary would look like.

[Emma Raducanu]

As someone who rarely watches documentaries, I found Taking Liberties to be extraordinarily infuriating, scary, depressing, uplifting and interesting. For it's duration the Labour government is criticised for infringing on human rights, privacy and civil liberties. Includes Tony Benn.

[Serge]

Can you elaborate as to what you mean by this? I can't really imagine what great editing in a documentary would look like.

He edits in clips from other films, etc, as a kind of commentary on whatever is being discussed. For example, clips of Laurence Olivier as Richard III when Rotten is discussing his stage mannerisms. It works in this film, but he gets carried away with it in 'Strummer' to the point that it gets annoying.

[George Oscar Bluth II]

I'll second In the Shadow of the Moon. It's a wonderful evocation of a more innocent era and a monument to everyone involved in what is probably mankind's greatest single  technological achievement to date.

[lactating man nips]

Every Errol Morris documentary I've watched(Thin Blue Line, Fog Of War, Vernon Florida, Gates of Heaven) has been brilliant too.

I was blown away by Thin Blue Line and I though 'Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.' was very good too. Found Gates of Heaven and Vernon Florida a bit hard going though I must admit.

My favourite ever is Hearts of Darkness, wonderful execution, fascinating subject with an incredibly strong inside look at Coppola for the whole thing thanks to his wife recording him without permission.

Yes, a must watch that one! In a similar vein I heartily recommend 'Burden of Dreams' about the troubled production of Herzogs' Fitzcaralldo.

[An tSaoi]

What's the name of that famous Spelling Bee one?

[Tommy Trumpet]

Control Room.

[Lee]

Making Of Guinea Pig - a low-budget VFX-gore masterclass.

Grizzly Man - I've expressed my love for this film in the Werner Herzog thread, but it deserves another mention here - a combination of Treadwell's incredibly brave/foolhardy cinematography and presenting style and Herzog's concise and emotional commentary makes this one of the most moving, life-affirming pieces of cinema I've ever seen.

Man On Wire - what they ^^^ said.

I know there are more, but it's past 1am, and I need to sleep.

[joeyzaza]

What's the name of that famous Spelling Bee one?

Spellbound?

And on a slightly similar theme, "Etre et avoir" is a cracker.

[rjd2]

What's the name of that famous Spelling Bee one?

Spellbound.
I liked Control Room as well. I suppose my favorite would be Capturing the Friedmans, even if it possibly one of the most depressing films ever.

[TotalNightmare]

I'd like to place these in the list (as a good few others have already been mentioned)

Firstly, the documentary on the 4 disc Brazil boxset 'The Battle of Brazil' is a good look at the murderous production and subsequent battle for the final edit. It may skim the surface, but it should put you in mind to hunt down and read the accompanying book that is just fantastic.
(As a companion piece, you can't go wrong with Lost in La Mancha)

Next I'd like to recommend King of Kong which is just a brilliant story if nothing else. There has been talk of turning this into a narrative movie, but i don't see the point, this doc works as well as any mainstream sports movie i can think of. The 'Tortoise and Hare' style adventure, set in the world of competitive video game playing has a wonderful and mental cast of characters - namely,all the lackies that fester around the might of Billy Mitchell - a brilliant villain worthy of Disney.

Finally, 9/11 as its simply breathtaking footage and it sounds crass to comment how perfectly the doc crew seem to be in the perfect place to capture this horrific event, but you can't deny the objective power of just the utter madness of the whole day.

[Roy*Mallard]

The World At War - Absolutely stunning from start to finish. Wonderful footage throughout and has served me as quite a thorough history lesson. 

[mycroft]

The Great War. BBC series of the 1960s that provided the template for the aforementioned The World at War. Brilliant stuff.

Jacob Bronowski's The Ascent of Man. Downloaded after the repeated recommendation of Charlie Brooker, this series is essentially a collection of personal essays on the evolution of our biological, social, religious and scientific ways. Bronowski is so... well, just so damn clever that it's stunning.

[Desi Rascal]

 "Why We Fight", The Industrial Military Complex, from Eisenhower to Bush

http://freedocumentaries.org/theatre.php?filmid=93&id=920&wh=1000x720

"War On Democracy" American Foriegn Policy in Latin America
http://freedocumentaries.org/theatre.php?filmid=171&id=1033&wh=1000x720

"News from a private war" Drugs policing in Brazil

[An tSaoi]

Not the greatest or anything, but I really liked Andrew Marr's Darwin doc a while back. Anyone have any suggestions for a really good Darwin documentary?

[biggytitbo]

History of Britain
World At War
Pandora's Box
The Power of Nightmares
Secret Rulers of the World
The God Who Wasn't there.

[Santa's Boyfriend]

Paradise Lost is a really, really unpleasant watch - not least because it starts with police footage of the bodies of three naked children lying murdered in woodland.  The story covers the trial of three boys who have clearly been arrested and tried for the murder because they're heavy metal fans, which in a small town in the US deep south, is apparently a reasonable suspicion.  It's one of the most upsetting documentaries I've ever seen because whilst the trial clearly fails to establish guilt, the community are clearly convinced that they did it from the very beginning.

[Paaaaul]

Super Size Me - It's hard to believe, but before this film no-one knew that burgers were bad for you.

[An tSaoi]

You're joking right? It's fun to watch for a bit, but it's by no means a great documentary.

Edit: You're clearly joking. I need to fix my sarcasm detector.

[Ignatius_S]

Super Size Me - It's hard to believe, but before this film no-one knew that burgers were bad for you.

Absolutely - and I for one certainly had to re-evaluate my dietary habits of eating every meal at fast food restaurants after watching Morgan Spurlock's masterpiece.

[kaprisky]

Dogtown and Z-Boys - I have no interest in skateboarding yet Stacy Peralta's film captured my attention because it showed you something going on underneath its surface, allowing you access to its own culture (the photos, the video footage, the journalism) and also not attempting to tie this to wider political/social contexts. It operated on its own terms. The follow-up film Riding Giants didn't quite match up to this level but it does something similar for the surfing culture.

Also the editing in The Filth and the Fury is startling, mixing Richard III, Hamlet and Max Wall, I think. "...and funny man Robert Aguayo!"

Zoo, about the bizarre death of a man who was having sex with a horse, is sub-Errol Morris. It takes ages to make its point but by that time you just don't care because it doesn't engage you.

Michael Moore's films are infuriating too but I quite liked Roger and Me because it was assembled quite well although his films always seem to be more about him than his subjects.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

The World At War comes as close as any television program comes to being compulsory viewing. If I see it in the TV Guides I still try to make time for it just out of deference (I do the same for things like Dad's Army though in fairness).

The Life Of Mammals is my favourite Attenborough series because he's still out in the fields and the oceans getting his hands dirty despite being a venerable old fucker. Mammals are also generally the most interesting creatures in my opinion. Creatively, it spans the eras between innovation being used to improve/give new perspectives on old themes and the crystal clarity of HD/super-slo-mo cameras that are on pretty much every nature doc now. Planet Earth is the best looking program ever, (South Pacific runs it close though) but the structure of the series leaves a lot to be desired in my opinion.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I have to say, although there were bits of Filth and the Fury I liked, such as him showing the background to the problems in England at the time, I really hated the insertion of clips from other films, and having them all interviewed in silhouette seemed totally pointless. There was another documentary, which focused on punk as a whole and was made sometime in the 80s, which I preferred. Can't remember the name of it though.

Another mention for The World at War, and the channel 4 one The First World War.

And although it's highly disturbing, The Hunt for Britain's Paedophiles was totally gripping. The scene where they track down an old man, live on camera, who had comitted crimes 20+ years earlier, is riveting.

[mrfridge]

American Movie - Great doc about a guy trying desperately to realize his dream of directing a horror movie. Engaging protagonists, funny, touching and entertaining throughout. More info HERE.

[massive bereavement]

Five best documentary series:-

The Shock Of The New (1980) - Robert Hughes on the history of art, beginning with late 19th century Paris.

Dancing In The Streets (1997) - By far the best series on the history of pop/rock music.

The Beyond Within (1986) - Two part documentary on LSD.

Atheism - A Rough Guide To Disbelief (2004) - Jonathan Miller's series.

The Ascent Of Man (1973) - Just the best TV series I've ever seen.

Also have to mention "I'm Your Number One Fan" (1996) the C4 documentary that included Mike Reid stalker 'Blue Tulip Rose'. The first episode of "Ways Of Seeing" (1971) is very good too.