Sight & Sound's The Greatest Documentaries of All Time

A cameraman wanders around with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling inventiveness.

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 c...

"He wrote me...." A woman narrates the thoughts of a world traveler, meditations on time and memory expressed in words and images from places as far-flung as Japan, Guinea-Bissau, Iceland, and San Francisco.

Filmmaker Alain Resnais documents the atrocities behind the walls of Hitler's concentration camps.

Errol Morris's unique documentary dramatically re-enacts the crime scene and investigation of a police officer's murder in Dallas.

Nanook Of The North is Robert J. Flaherty’s beautiful film about an Inuit man named Nanook and his family. Filmed during one year of their life in the icy desolation of Northern Canada. The film was an enormous success and is the founder of the documentary film genre.

The film begins with a discussion between Rouch and Morin on whether or not it is possible to act sincerely in front of a camera. A cast of real life individuals are then introduced and are led by the filmmakers to discuss topics on the themes of French society and happiness in the working class.

Don’t Look Back is a documentary of Bob Dylan’s 1965 tour of England. The film begins with the famous and some say best music video of all times "Subterranean Homesick Blues.” The cameras follow Dylan as he experiments with the electric guitar for the first time.

Varda films and interviews gleaners in France in all forms, from those picking fields after the harvest to those scouring the dumpsters of Paris.

An old mother and her middle-aged daughter, the aunt and cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, live their eccentric lives in a filthy, decaying mansion in East Hampton.

An in-depth exploration of the various reactions by the French people to the Vichy government's acceptance of the German invasion.

Werner Herzog’s documentary film about the “Grizzly Man” Timothy Treadwell and what the thirteen summers in a National Park in Alaska were like in one man’s attempt to protect the grizzly bears. The film is full of unique images and a look into the spirit of a man who sacrificed himself for nature.

Filmmakers (and brothers) Albert and David Maysles follow four employees of a company that makes expensive, ornate, illustrated bibles as they attempt to sell the items door-to-door to less-than-interested customers, who are mainly poor or lower-middle-class Catholics with little money to spend on pretty Bibles.

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.

The film is a stark and graphic portrayal of the conditions that existed at the State Prison for the Criminally Insane at Bridgewater, Massachusetts. TITICUT FOLLIES documents the various ways the inmates are treated by the guards, social workers and psychiatrists.

This documentary follows two inner-city Chicago residents, Arthur Agee and William Gates, as they follow their dreams of becoming basketball superstars. Beginning at the start of their high school years, and ending almost 5 years later, as they start college, we watch the boys mature into men, still retaining their "Hoop Dreams".

A group of British children aged 7 from widely ranging backgrounds are interviewed about a range of subjects. The filmmakers plan to re-interview them at 7 year intervals to track how their lives and attitudes change as they age.

After a 7 year wait, director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born children from Seven Up! The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

After another 7 year wait, director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born children from Seven Up! and 7 Plus Seven. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

Just two years away from turning 30, participants in Michael Apted's documentary series are facing serious questions of identity and purpose, wondering whether they've found their place in the world.

Director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born adults after a 7 year wait. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

Director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born adults after a 7 year wait. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

49 Up is the seventh film in a series of landmark documentaries that began 42 years ago when UK-based Granada's World in Action team, inspired by the Jesuit maxim "Give me the child until he is seven and I will give you the man," interviewed a diverse group of seven-year-old children from all over England, asking them about their lives and their...

When a cross-section of seven-year-olds were interviewed for 7 Up in 1964 it was immediately evident that their social backgrounds influenced their attitudes towards life. While the upper class children were confident and self-assured, those from middle and working class backgrounds were resigned to a challenging life of hard work. This premise ...

The chronicle of the political tension in Chile in 1973 and of the violent counter revolution against the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende.

Chronicles the events immediately surrounding the CIA- supported coup itself.

Guzmán’s final instalment shifts from covering the actions of Allende’s opponents to those who battled to revive & promote their toppled leader’s vision for a new Chile.

A detailed look at the gradual decline of Shenyang’s industrial Tiexi district, an area that was once a vibrant example of China’s socialist economy. But industry is changing, and the factories of Tiexi are closing. Director Wang Bing introduces us to some of the workers affected by the closures, and to their families.

In a place where killers are celebrated as heroes, these filmmakers challenge unrepentant death-squad leaders to dramatize their role in genocide. The result is a surreal, cinematic journey, not only into the memories and imaginations of mass murderers, but also into a frighteningly banal regime of corruption and impunity

In Chile's Atacama Desert, astronomers peer deep into the cosmos in search for answers concerning the origins of life. Nearby, a group of women sift through the sand searching for body parts of loved ones, dumped unceremoniously by Pinochet's regime.

Set in a leper colony in the north of Iran, The House is Black juxtaposes "ugliness," of which there is much in the world as stated in the opening scenes, with religion and gratitude.

A documentary about fraud and fakery.

A filmed account of a bitterly violent miner strike.

A depiction of life in wartime Britain during the Second World War. Director Humphrey Jennings visits many aspects of civilian life and of the turmoil and privation caused by the war, all without narration.

A documentary following Kenzo Okuzaki, a 62-year-old WW2 veteran notorious for his protests against Emperor Hirohito, as he tries to expose the needless executions of two Japanese soldiers during the war.

Gimme Shelter is a film about the Rolling Stones live tour in 1969 and focusing on one concert that got out of hand. This documentary shows parts of the concerts, the violence, and the reaction after the fact by the band themselves.

A cryptic message from Bond’s past sends him on a trail to uncover a sinister organization. While M battles political forces to keep the secret service alive, Bond peels back the layers of deceit to reveal the terrible truth behind SPECTRE.

Set aboard a hulking fishing vessel as it navigates the treacherous waves off the New England coast. The very waters that once inspired Moby Dick, the film captures the harsh, unforgiving world of the fishermen in starkly haunting, yet beautiful detail.

Follows the Friedmans, a seemingly typical, upper-middle-class Jewish family whose world is instantly transformed when the father and his youngest son are arrested and charged with shocking and horrible crimes.

An early example of ultra-realism, this movie contrasts the quiet, bucolic life in the outskirts of Paris with the harsh, gory conditions inside the nearby slaughterhouses. Describes the fate of the animals and that of the workers in graphic detail.

A documentary on the life of the people of the Aran Islands, who were believed to contain the essence of the ancient Irish life, represented by a pure uncorrupted peasant existence centred around the struggle between man and his hostile but magnificent surroundings. A blend of documentary and fictional narrative, the film captures the everyday t...

The last collaboration of Artavazd Peleshian and cinematographer Mikhail Vartanov is a film-essay about Armenia's shepherds, about the contradiction and the harmony between man and nature, scored to Vivaldi's Four Seasons.

A documentary about the closure of General Motors' plant at Flint, Michigan, which resulted in the loss of 30,000 jobs. Details the attempts of filmmaker Michael Moore to get an interview with GM CEO Roger Smith.

Filmmaker Victor Erice follows Spanish artist Antonio Lopez in his painstaking attempt to paint the image of a tree.

Explores the complexity of the welfare system, highlighting issues like housing, unemployment, and medical problems. It shows both welfare workers and clients struggling to navigate the laws and regulations that impact their lives.

The infamous propaganda film of the 1934 Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg, Germany

This film shows the disaster of the Kuwaitian oil fields in flames. In contrast to the common documentary film there are no comments and few interviews. What must have been the hell itself is presented to the viewer in such beautiful sights and beautiful music that one has to be fascinated by it.

A movie with no conventional plot: merely a collection of expertly photographed scenes. Subject matter has a highly environmental theme.

This documentary short examines the special train on which mail is sorted, dropped and collected on the run, and delivered in Scotland on the overnight run from Euston, London to Glasgow.

A documentary on the effect of fishing the Nile perch in Tanzania's Lake Victoria. The predatory fish, which has wiped out the native species, is sold in European supermarkets, while starving Tanzanian families have to make do with the leftovers.