Documentary checklist

I’ve always been a lover of and advocate for documentaries, so I am happy to agree that we are in a golden age of documentary filmmaking, though I tend not to care much for those cited as most successful. So I want to speak up for some truly worthwhile nonfiction films that you may or may not have heard of.

On of my first posts to Cinema Salon was “33 docs to watch instead of Michael Moore” and I thought it opportune to update that list with all the documentaries I have reviewed and recommended since. Typing “33 docs” in the search box above will bring up the prior list, and similarly, you can call up my reviews of any of the titles below. Reviews of further well-regarded documentaries will follow forthwith.

Perhaps I need to re-emphasize the subjectivity (informed or not) of my ratings, a reaction to a particular viewing at a particular time, subject to change on re-viewing, but not as much as you might think. The Leonard Cohen is a case in point; a second time around the film’s flaws might register more, when at first I was dazzled by the subject himself, an introduction that felt revelatory.

*9+*
Hoop Dreams (1994)

*8+*
Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man (2006)

*8*
49 Up (2006) (“7 Up” series as a whole = *10*)
Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing (2006)
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005)
Grey Gardens (1976)
Jonestown: The Life and Death of the Peoples Temple (2006)
My Flesh and Blood (2003)
Neil Young: Heart of Gold (2006)
Rivers and Tides (2001)

*8-*
When the Levees Broke (2006)

*7+*
Bearing Witness (2005)
Born into Brothels (2004)
Bright Leaves (2004)
Festival Express (2004)
Gimme Shelter (1970)
Grizzly Man (2005)
Mad Hot Ballroom (2005)
No Direction Home (2005)
One Bright Shining Moment (2005)
Paradise Lost (1996) and Paradise Lost 2 (1999)
The Real Dirt on Farmer John (2005)
Street Fight (2005)
Unforgivable Blackness (2004)
Unknown White Male (2006)
Wordplay (2006)

*7*
The Corporation (2004)
Deliver Us From Evil (2006)
The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2006)
Iraq in Fragments (2006)
March of the Penguins (2005)
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (2004)
Michelangelo: Self Portrait (1989)
Murderball (2005)
The Road to Guantanamo (2006)
Sunset Story (2003)
Two Days in October (2005)
The White Diamond (2005)
Why We Fight (2006)

*7-*
Darwin’s Nightmare (2005)
Girlhood (2003)
An Inconvenient Truth (2006)
Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater (2006)
Sketches of Frank Gehry (2006)