Documentary

"Like real movies but with ugly people."

— Abed's take on this art form, Community, "Introduction to Film"

A film or series that revolves around non-news reporting of Non-Fiction subjects. While there are earlier examples, technical limitations prevented the genre from forming until the 20th century. The term itself was coined by reviewer John "The Moviegoer" Grierson in 1926.

Many documentaries are known to break several Omnipresent Tropes which exist in other genres due to nature of the documentaries.

Works of fiction or comedy sometimes use a style that imitates or parodies the Documentary, they can be found at: Documentary Episode, Faux Documentary, Faux-To Guide, and Mockumentary.

The Mondo is an interesting type of Exploitation Film that can be a hybrid of the serious types (the original Mondo Cane) or be totally fake (Faces of Death).

Compare and contrast News Broadcast. For a list of documentary features that have won or been nominated for Oscars, see Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

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Documentary Tropes

• The Ken Burns Effect
• Manipulative Editing
• National Geographic Nudity
• Ridiculously Cute Critter
• Shoot the Money
• Stock Footage
• Talking Heads

Examples:

Subcategories:

• Docu Soap
• Documentary of Lies
  • Twisting the Words
• Nature Documentary
  • Narrative-Driven Nature Documentary
• Rockumentary
• Speculative Documentary
• TV Documentary

• 9/11: About the actions and heroism of the FDNY's Engine 7 on that day. The documentary was originally supposed to be about the life of a probationary firefighter before the attacks forced a retool, and the film is noteworthy for featuring some of the most detailed footage ever recorded of the attacks, including the only clear footage of the first plane's impact and the only surviving footage filmed within the World Trade Center.
• Abducted in Plain Sight: The harrowing story of a young girl who is kidnapped by a family friend - twice.
• Abacus: Small Enough to Jail
• The Act of Killing: Follows the perpetrators of a 1965-1966 mass political killing in Indonesia as they re-enact their deeds.
  • The Look of Silence: A companion piece to The Act of Killing, following a massacre victim's brother as he confronts the aging killers.
• Algo habrán hecho por la historia argentina: A documentary about the history of Argentina.
• American Factory: Follows the former employees of a automotive factory after their old workplace is bought by a Chinese company and their attempt to unionize.
• The Aristocrats
• Asperger's Are Us: A look at a comedy troupe whose members all have Asperger's Syndrome, who seek to encourage better understanding of the autistic community through performances based on their own experiences.
• Baraka: A series of clips shot around the world detailing both human culture and nature—without narration—emphasizing the universality of human experience.
• The Battle of Russia
• The Battle of San Pietro
• The Beaver Trilogy
• Becoming YouTube is a weird mix of a serious documentary and Mockumentary-style sketches.
• Before Stonewall
• Being Elmo: A Puppeteer's Journey
• Beyond the Mat
• Big Fun in the Big Town
• Blackfish: An investigation into the SeaWorld franchise of marine parks and the controversy surrounding keeping orcas in captivity, following the deaths of three people at the hands of one of SeaWorld's whales.
• Blood Dolphins
• Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal & Greed
• Bondi Rescue: a documentary series following the lifeguards at Bondi Beach, NSW, Australia.
• The Bones Brigade: An Autobiography: A biography Stacy Peralta (one of the best skaters in the 70s)'s creation of the Powell Peralta company after the sudden disband of the Zephyr Skateboard team, and the start of the Bones Brigade, their rise to fame, their revolutionary contributions to the skateboarding community and the emotional roller coaster of each individual skaters.
• Bowling for Columbine: A look at the aftermath of the Columbine high school shootings, looking at the variety of suspected factors and its relationship with American firearms culture.
• Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony
• Brooklyn Bridge
• Capitalism: A Love Story
• The Captain From Nowhere: A documentary about Willi Herold, a 19-year-old German private who stumbled upon an SS Luftwaffe Captain's uniform a short while before the end of World War II and proceeded to use the power and authority it granted him to orchestrate a massacre in a German prisoner camp and to terrorize the Emsland region.
• Capturing the Friedmans
• Card Subject to Change: Life on the Professional Wrestling independent scene, for both Ring Oldies, current stars and young hopefuls.
• Cartel Land
• Carts of Darkness: The lives of homeless men who race shopping carts for thrills and collect cans for money.
• Cave of Forgotten Dreams
• The Celluloid Closet: An examination of the evolution of LGBT representation in film.
• Challenger The Final Flight: Examines the 1986 Challenger explosion and the lives of the astronauts on it.
• Chang
• Changing Our Minds: The Story of Dr. Evelyn Hooker
• Chaos on the Bridge: About the very Troubled Production of the first two seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation
• China Blue
• Citizenfour: About Edward Snowden and the NSA spying scandal.
• Cocaine Cowboys: A documentary about the rise of the illegal cocaine trade in Miami during the 1970s and 1980s. Also spawned a sequel, Cocaine Cowboys 2, about a small-time coke dealer who ends up working for notorious drug lord Griselda Blanco.
• Collective: An investigation into a deadly nightclub fire uncovers a massive scandal in Romanian hospitals.
• The Cove: About dolphin hunting/fishing in Japan and won an Oscar.
• Crip Camp A Disability Revolution: About a group of teenagers who meet in a summer camp for disabled children and adults in the late '60s who later unite to fight for the civil rights of themselves and their peers.
• Czechoslovakia 1968
• The Dark Side of Chocolate: About the widespread but strangely unknown-to-the-public use of child slaves in the cocoa industry.
• Dark Side of the Ring: About the tragedies of the professional wrestling industry.
• Dawson City: Frozen Time
• Dealt
• Dear Zachary
• De Nieuwe Orde
• De Nuremberg à Nuremberg: A French documentary about Nazi Germany.
• The Devil at Your Heels: About stuntman Ken Carter's ill-fated attempt to jump a jet car over the St. Lawrence River.
• Dinosaur! (1985)
• Dionne Warwick Dont Make Me Over
• Dirty Money: A documentary series showcasing various forms of financial crimes.
• Disasters at Sea
• Disneyland Dream, one family's (unusually sophisticated) home movie of their visit to Disneyland in 1956.
• Dreams of a Life:
• The Eagle Huntress
• Earthlings: About the horrific treatment of animals in the food industry, puppy mills, etc...
• Empire of Dreams: About the making of the original Star Wars trilogy.
• The Endless Summer
• Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
• Everest (1998)
• Faces Places
• Fahrenheit 9/11: An examination of the George W. Bush administration's handling of The War on Terror in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
• Fat Head: A rebuttal to Supersize Me.
• Felicia: Documentary short about a teenaged girl in 1965 Watts
• Fighting in the Age of Loneliness: A Join Bois documentary about the history of MMA and its popularity
• Finding Your Roots
• First Strike: About the possibility of a nuclear surprise attack on the United States.
• FitMC: Documents the evolution of 2b2t, an anarchy Minecraft server.
• The Fog of War: About former Secretary of Defence Robert Macnamara.
• Food Inc.
• For All Mankind
• Forbidden Love: The Unashamed Stories of Lesbian Lives
• The Forgotten Frontier — nurses tending to the poor in 1931 Appalachia
• Formula 1: Drive to Survive
• For the Bible Tells Me So
• Forensic Files
• Forks Over Knives
• Four Days in November
• 4 Little Girls
• Freedom on My Mind
• Free Solo: Follows Alex Honnold's climb of El Capitan.
• Fyre: A look at the infamous Fyre Festival, which was billed as an upper-crust music festival on a tropical paradise but turned out to be anything but that.
• Fyre Fraud: Another documentary about the Fyre Festival, this time investigating the founder of the ill fated event.
• The Game Changers 2018
• Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers
• Gates of Heaven
• General Idi Amin Dada: A Self-Portrait
• Genghis Blues
• Genocide
• The Girl Who Became Three Boys
• The Gleaners and I
• Grant (2020)
• Grass
• The Great War: A series chronicling the events of World War One as they happened weekly one hundred years ago.
• The Great White Silence: One of the oldest documentaries ever, a 1924 film recounting the ill-fated 1912 British expedition to the South Pole led by Robert Falcon Scott.
• Grey Gardens
• Grizzly Man: A look into the life of nature filmmaker Timothy Treadwell, whose enthusiasm for grizzly bears led to his and his girlfriend's violent deaths at the hands of one.
• Going Clear: About the Church of Happyology.
• Gunda: Nature Documentary set on a farm, with production credits to Joaquin Phoenix.
• Guns, Germs, and Steel
• Hail Satan?
• Hale County This Morning This Evening
• Harry & Meghan
• Hampow93: My Brother, Which I Care For
• Harlan County U.S.A.: Follows a group of miners fighting to unionize and the families working with them.
• Hearts and Minds
• Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse: About the Troubled Production of Apocalypse Now.
• Heckler: A documentary by Jamie Kennedy.
• Hellbound: A documentary about different perceptions of hell.
• High School: A Day in the Life at an American high school in 1968.
• High Score: a miniseries about the history of video games from the 1970s to the 2000s.
• A History of Scotland: Explores the history of Scotland.
• The History of the Seattle Mariners: A Jon Bois documentary about the bizarre history of the Seattle Mariners.
• Hollywood on Trial
• Home (2006): This documentary looks at New York City through the eyes of a number of famous people.
• Hoop Dreams
• The House Is Black
• How To With John Wilson
• I Am Big Bird
• I Am Not Your Negro: An look at the history of anti-black racism in America, as told through the writings of James Baldwin.
• Icarus
• If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front
• I Know That Voice: An in-depth look at voice acting as told by some living legends and familiar faces in the industry.
• I Love You, You Hate Me - about the rise and public backlash of Barney & Friends
• The Imposter (2012): A documentary about the disappearance of 13-year-old Nicholas Barclay and the man who claimed to be him.
• I Shouldn't Be Alive
• I'll Find a Way
• An Inconvenient Truth
• Indie Game: The Movie: A look at the production of Super Meat Boy, Fez, and Braid, providing an in-depth look at the double-edged nature of independent video game development.
• In Search of...: A documentary series centered around popular mysteries, with Leonard Nimoy as the narrator.
• In the Court of the Crimson King, an acclaimed 2022 documentary about the band King Crimson.
• In the Year of the Pig: A 1968 documentary about The Vietnam War and the events leading up to it.
• The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley
• The Invisible War
• Jesus Camp
• The Jewish Americans
• The Jinx: About billionaire murder suspect Robert Durst.
• Jiro Dreams of Sushi
• Jodorowsky's Dune
• Jonestown
• Kedi
• The Kids Guide to the Internet
• The Killing Of America
• The King of Kong
• Kiss Loves You
• Kon-Tiki
• Koyaanisqatsi
• Last Days in Vietnam — the panicked American flight from Saigon as the North Vietnamese close in on the South Vietnam capital at the end of The Vietnam War.
• The Last Lions: Following a lone lioness and her three cubs in the wilds of Botswana.
• LEGO Rewind: A guerrilla documentary / Video Review Show about various LEGO themes.
• Let the Fire Burn
• Let There Be Light
• The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter
• Long Shot (2017)
• The Long Way Home
• Looking For Ms Locklear - A documentary by Rhett & Link about their search for their first grade teacher.
• Loose Change
• Lost in La Mancha
• Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley's Island of Dr. Moreau
• Making a Murderer
• Manson, one of the first documentaries about Charles Manson and the Tate-LaBianca murders.
• Man with a Movie Camera
• Marjoe
• Marwencol
• Mayday, also called Air Crash Investigation
• The Memphis Belle
• Michael Des Barres: Who Do You Want Me to Be?
• Miracles for Sale: A Derren Brown special about the US faith healing industry.
• Misery Loves Comedy
• More Than Miyagi: The Pat Morita Story
• Moscow Strikes Back
• Murder Among the Mormons
• My Depression
• My Octopus Teacher
• My Old School
• Nanook of the North (1922), the Trope Maker, Robert Flaherty's film about life among the Inuk people of upper Hudson Bay.
• The Negro Soldier: A look at the role of black soldiers in the United States, both in World War II and in previous conflicts, intended as a way of boosting the morale of black officers during the latter.
• Next Goal Wins is the story of the worst team in international soccer and their attempts to win one game.
• Night and Fog
• No Clip
• O.J.: Made in America: A very long docuseries (three parts in theaters, five on TV) examining the life, career, and criminal cases of O. J. Simpson.
• Olympia: Leni Riefenstahl's documentary of the 1936 Berlin Olympics, which despite all the Nazi propaganda proved highly influential in how sports are dramatized onscreen.
• On Any Sunday
• One Day in September
• One Plus One: Jean-Luc Godard's film about, among other things, the Rolling Stones recording "Sympathy for the Devil".
• Paris Is Burning is about ball culture in New York City during the 1980s.
• The Pixar Story: about the history of Pixar.
• The Plow That Broke the Plains
• Point of Order: About the 1954 Senate subcommittee hearings to investigate conflicting accusations between Senator Joseph McCarthy and the U.S. Army.
• Powers of Ten
• Portrait of Jason
• Primary: Groundbreaking cinema verite film about the 1960 Wisconsin Democratic presidential primary contest between Hubert Humphrey and John F. Kennedy.
• Project Nim: About an experiment on a chimpanzee to see if they could learn how to communicate like a human if raised like a human child.
• Pumping Iron
• RBG: Life and career of Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
• Reclaiming the Blade: On medieval European swordmanship.
• The Red Pill: A look at the history of the Men's Rights Movement.
• Reel Bad Arabs: A documentary about the stereotyping of Arabs and other Middle Eastern peoples in mainstream media, particularly films, and all the Unfortunate Implications coming from it.
• Religulous
• Report from the Aleutians
• Restrepo
• Revolution (1968): This documentary explores hippiedom in San Francisco in 1967.
• Revolution (2012): This documentary explores the importance of saving the environment.
• Robert Frost: A Lover's Quarrel with the World
• Roger & Me: A documentary about the decline of the motor industry in Michigan and Michael Moore's attempts at getting General Motors CEO Roger Bonham Smith to see the effects of it firsthand.
• Ryan: Documentary short about animator Ryan Larkin unusual for itself being animated
• Sabaton History: Web series about military history co-produced by TimeGhost and the metal band Sabaton.
• Salesman
• Sans Soleil
• Santoalla
• Savage Kingdom
• Searching for Sugar Man: A look at how Rodriguez was hugely hit by Germans Love David Hasselhoff in South Africa during The Apartheid Era, leading to people there attempting to learn what became of him in the wake of a popular rumor that he committed suicide on-stage.
• Seconds from Disaster, about major disasters (natural or man-made) and the series of events leading up to them.
• Serengeti
• Serial: A podcast exploring the real life murder conviction of Adnan Syed and his potential innocence.
• Sherman's March
• Shoah
• Showbiz Kids: A documentary about Former Child Stars.
• Showdown in Seattle
• Sicko
• Siege: A documentary short about the siege of Warsaw in 1939.
• The Smash Brothers: A nine-episode Web Original following seven of the most influential Super Smash Bros. Melee players of all time, as well as the community surrounding them.
• The Social Dilemma: A documentary about how Social Media Is Bad, starring several tech insiders and academics.
• The Sorrow and the Pity
• Soviet Storm: World War II in the East
• Spain, the first globalization: A documentary about Spanish history and its Black Legend.
• Special When Lit: A look at the history, culture, and creators of Pinball.
• Spielberg
• The Square (2013)
• The Statue of Liberty
• Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie
• The Story of the Weeping Camel
• Street Fight
• Strong Island
• Summoning Salt's videos, documenting the history of speedrunning on a game-by-game (and goal-by-goal) basis.
• Super Size Me: One man's attempt to eat McDonald's, and only McDonalds, for 30 days in a row.
  • Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken!: Has fast food really gotten healthier? Maybe a transparent chicken sandwich restaurant will answer this burning question.
• The Sweatbox: The look into the history and making of the abandoned Disney film Kingdom of the Sun and its painful transformation into the film The Emperor's New Groove.
• Swindled: A podcast series covering white collar crimes.
• Thank You for Playing: A documentary about the creation of the critically acclaimed indie game That Dragon, Cancer
• They Shall Not Grow Old: a documentary by Peter Jackson about British soldiers' experiences in World War One, primarily using restored wartime footage and archived interviews from the soldiers themselves
• This Film is Not Yet Rated : A look at the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the frequent Double Standards applied to film ratings.
• The Thin Blue Line: A documentary that combines investigative journalism and Film Noir presentation to examine and attempt to overturn a false murder conviction.
• Three Identical Strangers
• Three Sisters: Searching for a Cure
• Tickled: David Ferrier's documentary on "competitive tickling," which takes a dark turn.
• The Ties That Bind 1985: A documentary on the life of the filmmaker's mother.
• A Time for Burning
• The Times of Harvey Milk
• Tilt: The Battle to Save Pinball: A documentary on the creation of the "Pinball 2000" game platform.
• Tokyo Olympiad: A look at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, and how they represented Japan's return to the world stage nearly 20 years after their defeat in World War II.
• Tower (2016): A documentary on the 1966 University of Texas tower shooting. Interestingly, this film recreates the shooting with actors portraying the people who there on the day of the shooting, recreating the scenes as recalled by some of the real survivors, then animated with rotoscoping to give the film a unique look.
• TPBAFK: A documentary about The Pirate Bay and the trial of its creators.
• Trainwreck: Woodstock '99, also known as Clusterf**k: Woodstock '99: A documentary about Woodstock '99.
• Tree Man (2015)
• Triumph of the Will: A propaganda piece from and about Nazi Germany pre-World War II.
• Trouble the Water
• Truth in 24
• 20 Feet from Stardom
• Twist of Faith
• Undefeated
• Urasawa Naoki No Manben
• Val
• The Vow (2020)
• Waking Sleeping Beauty
• The Weather Underground
• Welcome to Wrexham, documenting Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney's purchase of the Welsh soccer team Wrexham AFC.
• What Is A Woman: Matt Walsh asks this question of ordinary people after Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said she couldn't define a woman.
• When We Were Kings: Chronicles the "Rumble in the Jungle", the boxing match between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in which Ali defeated the previously unbeaten Foreman to regain the world heavyweight title.
• Who Killed the Electric Car?: It examines the reasons for the dismantlement of the electric car program of the early 2000s.
• Why We Fight: A series of propaganda films detailing the United States' motives for getting involved in World War II following their initial stance of neutrality, made as a direct response to Triumph of the Will.
  • Prelude to War: A look at the rise and threat of fascism in Germany, Italy, and Japan.
  • The Battle of Russia: A look at Russia and their past and present successes in repelling foreign invasions.
• Wild Wild Country
• Winnebago Man: Explores the phenomenon of viral videos, in particular that of one man's profanity-laden out-takes.
• Winter on Fire
• Word Wars: A documentary about competitive Scrabble playing.
• World War II: A series documenting the events of World War II week by week in real time.
• Young@Heart: The inspirational true story of a choir of senior citizens who perform modern rock music.
• Zoo

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