Top Rated Documentary Movies on Kanopy - Page 45

Miss Sharon Jones!

2015

Miss Sharon Jones!

2015
7.1
Two-time Academy Award® winner Barbara Kopple shines a powerful, inspiring and entertaining spotlight on contemporary soul queen Sharon Jones. As she prepares to release her much-anticipated new album, Sharon comes face to-face with the greatest challenge of her life: a grave cancer diagnosis. Follow this tour de force over the course of an eventful and remarkable year as she struggles to hold her band The Dap-Kings together while battling her way back to the stage with the unstoppable determination of a true soul survivor
Theory of Obscurity: A Film About the Residents

2015

Theory of Obscurity: A Film About the Residents

2015
6.7
Theory of Obscurity tells the story of the renegade sound and video collective known as The Residents…a story that spans 40 years and is clouded in mystery. Many details surrounding the group are secret, including the identities of its members. They always perform wearing masks and costumes, which is part of their magic. At its heart, this story is about perseverance and chasing your dream. The Residents never caved to convention. They never compromised. They’ve followed their muse for decades and thousands of fans have hung on for the ride. Along the way they’ve also inspired many people to be weird, take chances and find their own voice.
Food Chains

2014

Food Chains

2014
7
This call to arms documentary details the questionable ethics of the food supply industry, pointing out the power of huge supermarket chains to dictate low wages and inhumane labor conditions for farmworkers in the United States.
Regarding Susan Sontag

2014

Regarding Susan Sontag

2014
5.7
An intimate study of one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the 20th century tracking feminist icon Susan Sontag’s seminal, life-changing moments through archival materials, accounts from friends, family, colleagues, and lovers, as well as her own words, as read by Patricia Clarkson.
German Concentration Camps Factual Survey

2017

German Concentration Camps Factual Survey

2017
7.3
On the 29th September 1945, the incomplete rough cut of a brilliant documentary about concentration camps was viewed at the MOI in London. For five months, Sidney Bernstein had led a small team – which included Stewart McAllister, Richard Crossman and Alfred Hitchcock – to complete the film from hours of shocking footage. Unfortunately, this ambitious Allied project to create a feature-length visual report that would damn the Nazi regime and shame the German people into acceptance of Allied occupation had missed its moment. Even in its incomplete form (available since 1984) the film was immensely powerful, generating an awed hush among audiences. But now, complete to six reels, this faithfully restored and definitive version produced by IWM, is being compared with Alain Resnais’ Night and Fog (1955).
Radio Bikini

1988

Radio Bikini

1988
7.4
It starts with a live radio broadcast from the Bikini Atoll a few days before it is annihilated by a nuclear test. Shows great footage from these times and tells the story of the US Navy Sailors who were exposed to radioactive fallout. One interviewed sailor suffered grotesquely swollen limbs and he is shown being interviewed with enormous left arm and hand.
Bound by Flesh

2012

Bound by Flesh

2012
5.9
Conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton were once the cream of the sideshow crop. Taught to sing and dance at an early age, the winsome duo ascended through the early 20th-century vaudeville circuit as a side attraction (working alongside Bob Hope and Charlie Chaplin as well as a memorable turn in the Tod Browning classic "Freaks") before a cascade of unscrupulous management and harsh mistreatment brought their careers (and lives) tumbling down. This engrossing glimpse into a bygone era is filled with fascinating interviews and rare archival footage.
Burt's Buzz

2014

Burt's Buzz

2014
6.6
BURT'S BUZZ is an in-depth and personal look at the life of Burt Shavitz, known to millions around the world as the "Burt" of the Burt’s Bees natural product brand. The documentary explores what it means to be marketed as an icon, and how that life differs from the one of the man behind the logo.
Web Junkie

2014

Web Junkie

2014
6.6
China is the first country in the world to classify Internet addiction as a clinical disorder. Caught in the Net features a Beijing treatment center where Chinese teenagers are being "deprogrammed," and follows the story of three boys from the day they arrive at the center, to their three-month treatment period, and their long awaited return home. The film provides a microcosm of modern Chinese life and investigates one of the symptoms of the Internet age. It examines inter-generational pressures and the disregard of the human rights of minors who get caught in the net.
The Cockettes

2002

The Cockettes

2002
6.5
Documentary about the gender-bending San Francisco performance group who became a pop culture phenomenon in the early 1970s.
War Comes to America

1945

War Comes to America

1945
7
The seventh and final film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight World War II propaganda film series. This entry attempts to describe the factors leading up to America's entry into the Second World War.
After Tiller

2013

After Tiller

2013
6.5
Since the assassination of Dr. George Tiller in Kansas in 2009, only four doctors in the United States continue to perform third-trimester abortions. These physicians, all colleagues of Dr. Tiller, sacrifice their safety and personal lives in the name of their fierce, unwavering conviction to help women.
Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon

2008

Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon

2008
5.3
The outrageous story of 1970s porn icon Jack Wrangler, and how he rose to the top of the gay, and then straight, adult film industry.
Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer

1975

Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer

1975
7.2
Thom Andersen's hour-long documentary adroitly combines biography, history, film theory, and philosophical reflection. Muybridge's photographic studies of animal locomotion in the 1870s were a major forerunner of movies; even more interesting are his subsequent studies of diverse people, photographed against neutral backgrounds.
Genocide

1982

Genocide

1982
7.4
The mass murder of Jewish people by the Nazi regime is chronicled, with a warning that anti-Semitism is on the rise and the events of the Holocaust could happen again. The history of European Jewish culture and events before and during the Holocaust are seen in newsreels, photographs, and animated segments. The words of the victims of the era are read, and footage from the liberation os a concentration camp is shown.
Arakimentari

2004

Arakimentari

2004
6
A look at the life and work of Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi Araki and his impact on Japanese culture.
Gerhard Richter Painting

2011

Gerhard Richter Painting

2011
6.9
Gerhard Richter has spent over half a century experimenting with a tremendous range of techniques and ideas, addressing historical crises and mass media representation alongside explorations of chance procedures. This first glimpse inside his studio in decades is exactly that: a thrilling document of the 79-year-old's creative process, juxtaposed with rare archival footage and intimate conversations with his critics and collaborators.
In the Mirror of Maya Deren

2002

In the Mirror of Maya Deren

2002
7.4
Documentary about the life of avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren, who led the independent film movement of the 1940s.
Chasing Madoff

2010

Chasing Madoff

2010
5.6
A look at how one investigator spent ten years trying to expose Bernie Madoff's massive Ponzi scheme that scammed an estimated $18 billion from investors.
Brooklyn Bridge

1981

Brooklyn Bridge

1981
7.6
Today it's a symbol of strength and vitality. 135 years ago, it was a source of controversy. This documentary examines the great problems and ingenious solutions that marked the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. From conception to construction, it traces the bridge's transformation from a spectacular feat of heroic engineering to an honored symbol in American culture.