Popular Documentary Movies on Kanopy - Page 128

Angel of Nanjing

2015

Angel of Nanjing

2015
6.8
The Yangtze River Bridge in Nanjing is one of the most famous bridges in China. It is also the most popular place in the world to commit suicide. For the past 11 years Chen Si has been patrolling this bridge, looking to provide aid for those who've gone there to end their lives. Incredibly, he has saved over 300 people since he began - nearly one every two weeks.
Jia Zhangke, A Guy from Fenyang

2016

Jia Zhangke, A Guy from Fenyang

2016
6.9
Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke returns to the shooting locations of his films, along with his actors, friends and close collaborators. Jia recalls the inspiration sources for his movies, such as Platform, Still Life and A Touch of Sin. The film is the memory of a filmmaker and of a country in convulsion, China, which reveals itself little by little.
Missing Young Woman

2001

Missing Young Woman

2001
7.1
This gripping documentary investigates the disappearance of young women from assembly plants that line the Mexican-American border.
Church & State

2018

Church & State

2018
4.8
Church & State is the improbable story of a brash, inexperienced gay activist and a tiny Salt Lake City law firm that joined forces to topple Utah’s gay marriage ban. The film’s ride on the bumpy road to equality in Utah offers a glimpse at the Mormon church’s influence in state politics and the squabbles inside the gay community that nearly derailed a chance to make history. Church & State is a story of triumph, setback and a little-known lawsuit that should have failed, but instead paved the way for a U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized gay unions nationwide.
You Burn Me

2025

You Burn Me

2025
10
An adaptation of “Sea Foam”, a chapter from Cesare Pavese’s “Dialoghi con Leucò” published in 1947. The ancient Greek poet Sappho and the nymph Britomartis meet beside the sea and have a conversation about love and death. Sappho is said to have thrown herself into the ocean from lovesickness. Britomartis apparently tumbled off a cliff and into the water while fleeing from a man. Together, the two discuss the stories and images that have emerged around them to try and understand, at least for a moment, the bittersweet nature of desire.
Who Does She Think She Is

2008

Who Does She Think She Is

2008
1
"Who Does She Think She Is?," a documentary by Academy Award winning filmmaker Pamela Tanner Boll, features five fierce women who refuse to choose. Through their lives, we explore some of the most problematic intersections of our time: mothering and creativity, partnering and independence, economics and art.
The Walrus and the Whistleblower

2020

The Walrus and the Whistleblower

2020
7.5
A documentary following the legal battles between Phil Demers and Marineland, and exposing the mistreatment of animals in theme parks.
The Last Mogul

2005

The Last Mogul

2005
5.3
A biography of powerful Hollywood agent and executive Lew Wasserman.
Inside Lara Roxx

2012

Inside Lara Roxx

2012
5.8
A Montreal girl takes a disastrous trip inside the porn industry.
Jacqueline du Pré: Genius and Tragedy

2025

Jacqueline du Pré: Genius and Tragedy

2025
Yo-Yo Ma narrates a documentary about the remarkable cellist Jacqueline du Pré, whose life and career were cut short by multiple sclerosis.
The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till

2005

The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till

2005
6.4
Never-before-seen testimony is included in this documentary on Emmett Louis Till, who, in 1955, was brutally murdered after he whistled at a white woman.
Grand Coulee Dam

2017

Grand Coulee Dam

2017
6
During the darkest days of the Depression when construction was started on Grand Coulee Dam, everything about it was described in superlatives. It would be the "Biggest Thing on Earth," the salvation of the common man, a dam and irrigation project that would make the desert bloom, a source of cheap power that would boost an entire region of the country. Of the many public works projects of the New Deal, Grand Coulee Dam loomed largest in America's imagination, promising to fulfill President Franklin Roosevelt's vision for a "planned promised land" where hard-working farm families would finally be free from the drought and dislocation caused by the elements.
Cooking up a Tribute

2015

Cooking up a Tribute

2015
6.3
The Roca brothers, co-owners of one of the world's best restaurants, made the decision to close their restaurant for five weeks to tour six cities in four different countries with the entire kitchen and dining room staff.
Code Red: Youth of the Nation

2022

Code Red: Youth of the Nation

2022
With more school shootings in 2021 than any year on record, Code Red: Youth of the Nation exposes the fatal cost of our children's education. The documentary seeks to restore the safety of our schools by providing the tools and solutions to put an end to these tragedies.
8 Days: To the Moon and Back

2019

8 Days: To the Moon and Back

2019
7.4
Join Apollo 11 on its historic journey. The film seamlessly blends mission audio featuring conversations among Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins with new footage, NASA archive and stunning CGI to recreate the first moon landing.
Soufra

2017

Soufra

2017
7.7
The unlikely and wildly inspirational story of intrepid social entrepreneur, Mariam Shaar – a generational refugee who has spent her entire life in the Burj El Barajneh refugee camp just south of Beirut, Lebanon. Follow Mariam as she sets out against all odds to change her fate by launching a successful catering company, “Soufra,” and then expand it into a food truck business with a diverse team of fellow refugee woman who now share this camp as their home.
Chasing Voices: The Story of John Peabody Harrington

2021

Chasing Voices: The Story of John Peabody Harrington

2021
For 50 years, controversial ethnographer John Peabody Harrington crisscrossed the United States, frantically searching and documenting dying Native American languages. Harrington amassed over a million pages of notes on over 150 different tribal languages. Some of these languages were considered dead until his notes were discovered. Today tribes are accessing the notes, reviving their once dormant languages, and bringing together a new generation of language learners in the hope of saving Native languages.
Picasso and Braque Go to the Movies

2008

Picasso and Braque Go to the Movies

2008
4.4
The influence that artists Pablo Picasso and George Braque had on the world of cinema is the subject of this documentary from filmmaker Arne Glimcher. A lifelong lover of film, Picasso was intrigued by the machines used to create moving pictures, as well as the images they produced. In this film, artists such as Martin Scorsese, Julian Schnabel, Chuck Close, and the late Robert Rauschenberg reveal how Picasso and Braque's shared love of film helped to create some of the greatest art of the 20th Century. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
Being Thunder

2021

Being Thunder

2021
8
Sherente Harris, a two-spirit genderqueer teenager from the Narragansett tribe in Rhode Island, boldly challenges the status quo of what it means to be a queer Indigenous person in a world bound by binary gender roles.
The Deal

2015

The Deal

2015
Stop-motion animation on the arranging of marriages in 1950/60s set in the Eastern-Polish borderland. The script is based on a part of Mikołaj Smyk's diary, the director's grandfather. The biographical objects used in the animation, such as an authentic headscarf, Polish and Russian books, the copy of Mikołaj Smyk's diary and photographs help situate the story in its original environment.