Popular Documentary Movies on Kanopy - Page 48

Deep Hearts

1980

Deep Hearts

1980
Deep Hearts is a film about the Bororo Fulani, a nomadic society located in central Niger Republic and the title is a reference to an important aspect of these people’s thought and demeanor.
Made in Ethiopia

2024

Made in Ethiopia

2024
10
When a massive Chinese factory complex attempts a high-stakes expansion in rural Ethiopia, three women in search of prosperity have their faith in industrialization tested to the limit. Filmed over four years with singular access, Made in Ethiopia lifts the curtain on China’s historic but misunderstood impact on Africa, and explores contemporary Ethiopia at a moment of profound crisis. The film was awarded the Jury Special Mention at Tribeca Festival.
Michel Gondry: Do It Yourself

2023

Michel Gondry: Do It Yourself

2023
7.9
A portrait of French filmmaker Michel Gondry, creator, for three decades, of an imperfect, astonishing, fascinating, damaged and poetic work.
Racing Extinction

2015

Racing Extinction

2015
7.8
An unlikely team of activists and innovators hatches a bold mission to save endangered species.
Isamu Noguchi

1972

Isamu Noguchi

1972
Isamu Noguchi talks about his career in this documentary featuring Ezra Pound.
Anvil! The Story of Anvil

2008

Anvil! The Story of Anvil

2008
7.6
At 14, best friends Robb Reiner and Lips made a pact to rock together forever. Their band, Anvil, hailed as the "demi-gods of Canadian metal" influenced a musical generation that includes Metallica, Slayer, and Anthrax. Following a calamitous European tour, Lips and Robb, now in their fifties, set off to record their 13th album in one last attempt to fulfill their boyhood dreams.
When Two Worlds Collide

2016

When Two Worlds Collide

2016
7.2
In this tense and immersive tour de force, audiences are taken directly into the line of fire between powerful, opposing Peruvian leaders who will stop at nothing to keep their respective goals intact. On the one side is President Alan Garcia, who, eager to enter the world stage, begins aggressively extracting oil, minerals, and gas from untouched indigenous Amazonian land. He is quickly met with fierce opposition from indigenous leader Alberto Pizango, whose impassioned speeches against Garcia’s destructive actions prove a powerful rallying cry to throngs of his supporters. When Garcia continues to ignore their pleas, a tense war of words erupts into deadly violence.
Orlando, My Political Biography

2023

Orlando, My Political Biography

2023
6.9
Virginia Woolf's 1928 novel "Orlando: A Biography" follows the centuries-spanning life of a young nobleman who awakens to find that they are a woman. Almost a century after its publication, Paul B. Preciado claims that fiction has become reality and Orlando's story lies at the root of all contemporary trans and non-binary life.
David Baddiel: Jews Don't Count

2022

David Baddiel: Jews Don't Count

2022
10
The writer and comedian looks at antisemitism and the progressive left. From theatre to football, Baddiel explores a political blindspot with Stephen Fry, Miriam Margolyes and Neil Gaiman.
Pina

2011

Pina

2011
7.4
Pina is a feature-length dance film in 3D with the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, featuring the unique and inspiring art of the great German choreographer, who died in the summer of 2009.
Long Haulers

2020

Long Haulers

2020
Through experimentation, direct observational filmmaking, and performative play, filmmaker Amy Reid rides and films with women truckers who have fled domestic violence, the stigmas of being formerly incarcerated, and mental health issues. The three subjects -- Sandi, Lori, and Tracy -- each share how they started trucking and what keeps them trucking.
Cold Case Hammarskjöld

2019

Cold Case Hammarskjöld

2019
6.8
Ndola, Northern Rhodesia (currently Zambia), September 18, 1961. Swedish economist and diplomat Dag Hammarskjöld, Secretary General of the UN, dies mysteriously in a plane crash. Decades later, Danish journalist and filmmaker Mads Brügger and Swedish researcher Göran Björkdahl investigate the case in search of definitive closure.
Nostalgia for the Light

2010

Nostalgia for the Light

2010
7.4
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.
Gray Matters

2016

Gray Matters

2016
Gray Matters explores the long, fascinating life and complicated career of architect and designer Eileen Gray, whose uncompromising vision defined and defied the practice of modernism in decoration, design and architecture. Making a reputation with her traditional lacquer work in the first decade of the 20th century, she became a critically acclaimed and sought after designer and decorator in the next before reinventing herself as an architect, a field in which she laboured largely in obscurity. Apart from the accolades that greeted her first building –persistently and perversely credited to her mentor–her pioneering work was done quietly, privately and to her own specifications. But she lived long enough (98) to be re-discovered and acclaimed. Today, with her work commanding extraordinary prices and attention, her legacy, like its creator, remains elusive, contested and compelling.
Rams

2018

Rams

2018
7.4
RAMS is a documentary portrait of legendary designer Dieter Rams by filmmaker Gary Hustwit. For over fifty years, Rams has left an indelible mark on the field of product design with his iconic work at Braun and Vitsoe, and his influence on Apple. So at 86 years old, why does he now regret being a designer? RAMS is a design documentary, but it’s also a rumination on consumerism, materialism, and sustainability. Dieter's philosophy is about more than just design, it’s about a way to live. The film also features an original score by pioneering musician Brian Eno.
Life Itself

2014

Life Itself

2014
7.5
The surprising and entertaining life of renowned film critic and social commentator Roger Ebert (1942-2013): his early days as a freewheeling bachelor and Pulitzer Prize winner, his famously contentious partnership with Gene Siskel, his life-altering marriage, and his brave and transcendent battle with cancer.
Bettie Page Reveals All

2013

Bettie Page Reveals All

2013
6.7
The world's greatest pin-up model and cult icon, Bettie Page, recounts the true story of how her free expression overcame government witch-hunts to help launch America's sexual revolution. When she saw the film The Notorious Bettie Page, produced by HBO in 2006, the main person concerned reacted unequivocally: “Lies! Lies!” In a long interview recorded shortly before her death, the woman who entered the collective unconscious as the ultimate pin-up gave her version of events to director Mark Mori. In a gravelly voice, Bettie Page tells her own story and lifts the veil on areas often hidden by images that have made so many men and women fantasize since the 1950s: her abused childhood, an eclipse that lasted forty years, her mental illness. Through testimonies and unpublished archives, this documentary brings back to life a body and a face endlessly declined before our eyes, just as Bettie wanted: “I would like people to remember me as I was in the photos.”
Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President

2020

Jimmy Carter: Rock & Roll President

2020
6.9
This rockumentary-style presidential portrait shows how Jimmy Carter reinvigorated a post-Watergate America—with the music of the counterculture, including the Allman Brothers, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, and Jimmy Buffett.
Many Beautiful Things

2015

Many Beautiful Things

2015
6
In an age when women were incapable of joining the artistic dialogue, Lilias Trotter managed to win the favour of celebrated critics.
The Conqueror: Hollywood Fallout

2024

The Conqueror: Hollywood Fallout

2024
5.3
The story of one of the great environmental disasters to befall the United States, and the terrible movie that helped bring the catastrophe to light.