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Thought-Provoking Documentaries

Thought-Provoking Documentaries

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Thought-Provoking Documentaries
  • Landscape Film, Roberto Burle Marx

    Movie

    Directed by João Vargas Penna • Documentary • 2019 • Brazil • Portuguese with English subtitles
    Featuring Roberto Burle Marx, Amir Haddad

    A journey through the art and life of the Brazilian landscape architect and painter best known for the iconic black-and-white mosaic promenades that line Rio ...

  • Jazz on a Summer's Day

    Movie

    Directed by Bert Stern • Documentary • 1959 • US • English
    Featuring Louis Armstrong, Thelonius Monk, Anita O'Day

    Filmed at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival and directed by renowned photographer Bert Stern, this film features intimate performances by an all-star line-up of musical legends includin...

  • Invisible Valley

    Movie

    Directed by Aaron Maurer • Documentary • 2021 • US • English, Spanish with English subtitles
    Featuring Congressman Raul Ruiz

    "Invisible Valley" weaves together the disparate stories of undocumented farmworkers, wealthy snow- birds, and music festival-goers over the course of a year in California...

  • Coming Out Under Fire

    Movie

    Directed by Arthur Dong • Documentary • 1994 • US • English
    Featuring Salome Jens, Phillis Abry, David Barrett

    Arthur Dong’s award-winning films masterfully explore the LGBTQ experience and powerfully illustrate the many faces of the gay rights struggle in America. He dramatically reveals the...

  • The Raft

    Movie

    Directed by Marcus Lindeen • Documentary • 2018 • Sweden • English, Swedish, French, German, Japanese, Spanish with English subtitles
    Featuring Daniel Gimenez Cacho, Fe Seymour, Maria Bjornstam

    In the summer of 1973, a young international crew of six women and five men embarked together on an un...

  • M. C. Escher: Journey to Infinity

    Movie

    Directed by Robin Lutz • Documentary • 2021 • Netherlands • English, Dutch, Italian and German with English subtitles
    Featuring Stephen Fry, George Escher

    Equal parts history, psychology, and psychedelia, Robin Lutz’s entertaining, eye-opening portrait of M.C. Escher gives us the man through his...

  • In Case of Emergency

    Movie

    Directed by Carolyn Jones • Documentary • 2020 • US • English
    Featuring Cathlyn Robinson, Michelle Lyon, Rabih Saad

    Following emergency nurses and their patients in seven unique settings across the U.S, this documentary sheds light on the biggest healthcare crises facing Americans today, and the...

  • In Balanchine's Classroom

    Movie

    Directed by Connie Hochman • Documentary • 2021 • US • English
    Featuring George Balanchine, Jacques d'Amboise, Merrill Ashley

    "In Balanchine's Classroom" takes us back to the glory years of George Balanchine's New York City Ballet through the remembrances of his former dancers and their quest to...

  • Hitler's Hollywood

    Movie

    Directed by Rüdiger Suchsland • Documentary • 2018 • Germany • German with English subtitles
    Featuring Udo Kier, Susan Sontag

    Narrated by Udo Kier, Rüdiger Suchsland's film suggests that the Third Reich was an immersive movie starring the German nation created by Propaganda Minister Joseph Goeb...

  • Harold and Lillian: A Hollywood Love Story

    Movie

    Directed by Daniel Raim • Documentary • 2017 • US • English
    Featuring Harold Michelson, Lillian Michelson, Mel Brooks

    Movie fans know the work of Harold and Lillian Michelson, even if they don't recognize the names. Working largely uncredited in the Hollywood system, storyboard artist Harold and...

  • The Goddesses of Food

    Movie

    Directed by Verane Frediani • Documentary • 2017 • France • French with English subtitles
    Featuring Dominique Crenn, Barbara Lync, Alice Waters

    In the male dominated food universe, discover the women changing the game on all levels. "Goddessess of Food" presents the best female chefs, including...

  • The Force

    Movie

    Directed by Peter Nicks • Documentary • 2015 • US • English
    Featuring Sean Whent, Cat Brooks, Jonathan Cairo

    Winner of the Directing Award at the Sundance Film Festival "The Force" is a cinema vérité look inside the long-troubled Oakland Police Department as it struggles to confront federal dema...

  • Double Take

    Movie

    Directed by Johan Grimonprez • Documentary • 2009 • Belgium, Germany, Netherlands • English
    Featuring Alfred Hitchcock, Ron Burrage, Mark Perry

    Johan Grimonprez uniquely combines 60's advertising, hysterical Red Menace newsreels, and Alfred Hitchcock into a black comedy journey through the globa...

  • Fiddler’s Journey to the Big Screen

    Movie

    Directed by Daniel Raim • Documentary • 2022 • US • English
    Featuring Jeff Goldblum, Norman Jewison, Topol

    Narrated by Jeff Goldblum and directed by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Daniel Raim, this documentary captures the humor and drama of director Norman Jewison's quest to recreate the lost world ...

  • The Woman Who Loves Giraffes

    Movie

    Directed by Alison Reid • Documentary • 2019 • Canada • English
    Featuring Anne Innis Dagg, Tatiana Maslany, Victor Garber

    In 1956, 23-year-old biologist Anne Innis Dagg made a solo journey to South Africa to study giraffes in the wild. In "The Woman Who Loves Giraffes", Anne (then 86) retraces ...

  • Denise Ho - Becoming the Song

    Movie

    Directed by Sue Williams • Documentary • 2020 • US • English and Cantonese with English subtitles
    Featuring Denise Ho

    "Denise Ho – Becoming the Song" profiles the openly gay Hong Kong singer and human rights activist Denise Ho. Drawing on unprecedented access, the film explores her remarkable jo...

  • Machines

    Movie

    Directed by Rahul Jain • Documentary • 2017 • India, Finland, Germany • Hindi with English subtitles

    Marrying stunning visuals with social advocacy, Rahul Jain's debut documentary - winner of the Special Jury Award for Cinematography at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival - takes audiences into the ...

  • Defining Hope

    Movie

    Directed by Carolyn Jones • Documentary • 2017 • US • English
    Featuring Rudolph Bilotti Sr., Berthold Cohen, Charlotte Cohen

    "Defining Hope" weaves the stories of patients with life-threatening illnesses, and the nurses who guide them as they make choices about how they want to live, how much m...

  • To Be and To Have

    Movie

    Directed by Nicolas Philibert • Documentary • 2002• France • French with English subtitles
    Featuring Georges Lopez

    The one-room schoolhouse, where one teacher instructs several grades at once, is generally regarded as a quaint thing of the past. However, Nicolas Philibert offers an in-depth look...

  • The Competition

    Movie

    Directed by Claire Simon • Documentary • 2016 • France • French with English subtitles
    Featuring Alain Bergala, Emilie Deleuze, Xanae Bove

    Claire Simon, one of France’s leading documentarians, gives an enlightening all-access tour behind the scenes at France’s premiere film school, La Femis, dur...

  • The Challenge

    Movie

    Directed by Yuri Ancarani • Documentary • 2017 • France, Italy • Arabic with English subtitles
    Featuring Khaled Al-Hammadi, Nasser Al-Kaabi

    This exquisite documentary enters the surreal world of Qatari sheikhs with a passion for falconry. The opulence of this Middle Eastern gas state is on displ...

  • Bugs
    Movie

    Bugs

    Movie

    Directed by Andreas Johnsen • Documentary • 2016 • Denmark • English, Danish with English subtitles
    Featuring Josh Evans, Roberto Flore, Ben Reade

    "Bugs" is an artful and thoughtful new documentary that provides a perfect entry point to insect cuisine. Watch as filmmaker Andreas Johnsen and his ...

  • Bix: "Ain't None of Them Play Like Him Yet"

    Movie

    Directed by Brigitte Berman • Documentary • 1981 • US • English
    Featuring Bix Beiderbecke, Richard Basehart, Doc Cheatham

    Cornetist / pianist / composer Leon “Bix” Beiderbecke (1903-1931) was jazz’s man who got away. Beiderbecke became a legend even in his short lifetime, bringing an amazing new...

  • The Reason I Jump

    Movie

    Directed by Jerry Rothwell • Documentary • 2021 • US, UK • English
    Featuring Jordan O'Donegan, Jeremy Dear, David Mitchell

    Based on the best-selling book by Naoki Higashida and winner of the Audience Award at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, "The Reason I Jump" is an immersive cinematic explorat...