Best Documentary Movies

The best documentaries out-plot fiction: stranger twists, higher stakes, real consequences. Music docs, true crime, nature epics and portraits of obsessive people doing improbable things, ranked by audience rating. Find where each one streams and build a watchlist of the real world.

Drew: The Man Behind the Poster

2013

Capturing Avatar

2010

In Search of the Last Action Heroes

2019

Ballets Russes

2005

Bitchin': The Sound and Fury of Rick James

2021

Secrets of the Force Awakens: A Cinematic Journey

2016

The Tramp and the Dictator

2002

The Wildest Dream

2010

The Comedians of Comedy

2005

Koko: The Gorilla Who Talks to People

2016

Flying Saucers Over Hollywood: The 'Plan 9' Companion

1992

Everyman

1963

From Dreams - Making "The Last of Us: Left Behind"

2014

Paul Simon: Under African Skies

2012

The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to the Beatles

2014

When Harry Left Hogwarts

2011

Ricky Jay and His 52 Assistants

1996

The Disney Holiday Singalong

2020

The Choice 2020: Trump vs. Biden

2020

That's Entertainment, Part II

1976

Dogville Confessions

2004

The Road to El Camino: Behind the Scenes of El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie

2019

Toy Story at 20: To Infinity and Beyond

2015

Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

2016

Blank City

2011

Dumb: The Story of Big Brother Magazine

2017

Spin

1995

Star Wars: A Musical Journey

2005

Mysteries of Love

2002

The Comedians of Comedy: Live at The Troubadour

2007

Film Noir: Bringing Darkness to Light

2006

Teenage Paparazzo

2010

In Search of the Sanderson Sisters: A Hocus Pocus Hulaween Takeover

2020

The Fabelmans: A Family in Film

2023

Shania Twain: Not Just a Girl

2022

I Am Patrick Swayze

2019

It Ain't Over

2023

Tiny Giants 3D

2014

Burroughs: The Movie

1984

Patterns of Evidence: The Exodus

2015

Power of Grayskull: The Definitive History of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe

2017

Django & Django: Sergio Corbucci Unchained

2021

Thor: From Asgard to Earth

2011

Get Thrashed

2006

From One Second to the Next

2013

Conversation with Fritz Lang

1975

If You're Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast

2017

The Patriot: The Art of War

2000

Breaking Olympia: The Phil Heath Story

2024

The Perfect Weapon

2020

The Propaganda Game

2015

Cary Grant: A Class Apart

2004

My Darling Vivian

2020

Dreams: Cinema of the Subconscious

2010

That Guy Dick Miller

2014

Les Hautes solitudes

1974

Becoming Cousteau

2021

The Last Laugh

2016

Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe

1988

Small Potatoes: Who Killed the USFL?

2009