Best Documentary Movies of This Year (So Far)

Ditching the typical glossy sheen of celebrity documentaries, this film gives audiences an intimate and unvarnished view of Louis Tomlinson's life and career. Through never-before-seen home movie footage and behind the scenes access to Louis’ sell-out 2022 World Tour, the documentary offers a unique perspective on what it's like to be a musician in today's fast-paced world.

An access-all-areas look at the life of global megastar KSI as he goes through the most momentous year of his life. At the height of his fame, spurred on by a break-up, the multi-millionaire YouTuber, boxer and rapper starts to re-evaluate his priorities. How did JJ Olatunji, a nerdy kid from Watford become so successful and at what cost?

A temporary house for abandoned children near the front line in eastern Ukraine is run by a small group of social workers determined to provide comfort and safety. It may be humble and somewhat run-down, but this house is filled with love and offers up to nine months of refuge to kids whose fate will be determined by the system. During this short time, the caretakers try to nurture within them a sense of stability and normalcy.

Filmmaker Olly Lambert spends two months on Ukraine’s southern frontline with volunteer special forces as they begin the push to capture Kherson. The film follows “Hummer”, an experienced military commander who now finds himself a chaperone to completely inexperienced forces on the frontline.

The TRUE STORY of how Kara Robinson was kidnapped, assaulted and held captive for 18 hours, 15-year-old Kara Robinson plots a daring escape from a serial killer's apartment.

Filmmaker Morgan Neville captures Dave Letterman on his first visit to Dublin to hang out with Bono and The Edge in their hometown, experience Dublin, and join the two U2 musicians for a concert performance unlike any they’ve done before.

Miley Cyrus takes the stage in this must-see, Disney+ music event featuring debut performances of her highly anticipated eighth studio album, "Endless Summer Vacation." The global superstar’s cinematic, one-of-a-kind performances are threaded together with exclusive interviews where she provides insight to her new album and the person she is today.

This shocking documentary chronicles a happy-go-lucky nomad's ascent to viral stardom and the steep downward spiral that resulted in his imprisonment.

Filmed at LA’s SoFi Stadium, The Weeknd brings down the house – and your living room – in this epic concert event.

Follow the production of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” as the cast and crew take on the incredible challenge of remembering T’Challa with a chapter befitting the late king. Through intimate behind-the-scenes footage and interviews, watch Shuri take on the mantel of Wakanda’s hero and face a new foe from the ocean’s depths in Namor.

VICE's Matt Shea takes viewers inside Andrew Tate’s secret society and compound in Romania and gives a voice to women who were allegedly abused by him.

The untold story of the Abbey Road studio, all-star interviews and intimate access to the premises.

Featuring interviews with performers, activists and past employees, this documentary offers a deep dive into the successes and scandals of Pornhub.

This timely documentary chronicles the tech-fueled rise and Fyre-style fall of HQ Trivia, the revolutionary "game show on your phone" app that went viral, swept the nation, then crashed and burned. The global live-play game sensation drew millions of daily users to its frenetically fun trivia challenges and cash prizes, attracting celebrity fans including Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Neil Patrick Harris, Jimmy Kimmel, and Kelly Clarkson. But its success was undone by corporate clashes, cast changes, and a tragic death. Told through the eyes of former host Scott Rogowsky and other first-person players from inside and outside the company, the film documents the real-life comedy and tragedy that unfolded in front of and behind the cameras.

An illuminating look inside the lives of the Grucci family, whose Long Island-based fireworks business has been lighting up night skies around the world with spectacular displays since the 1800s.

The story of Amber Hagerman, the girl whose abduction and murder inspired the Amber Alert - which has since saved over 1000 kids. Amber's case remains unsolved. There are multiple suspects, a series of compelling theories, but proof has been elusive... This year, the 25th anniversary of Amber's murder, the detectives are still on the case, determined to solve the crime with new evidence and cutting edge DNA testing.

In 1990s Mumbai, a crime boss and his network wield unchecked power over the city — until the rise of "encounter cops," who brazenly kill their targets.

One of sport’s first and most influential megastars, beloved baseball icon and 5-time World Series champion Reggie Jackson contemplates his legacy as a trailblazing Black athlete fighting for dignity, respect, and a seat at the table in this intimate and revealing documentary exploring his life and barrier-busting career.

An exclusive interview with Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, in which he talks in-depth to Tom Bradby, journalist and ITV News at Ten presenter, covering a range of subjects including his personal relationships, never-before-heard details surrounding the death of his mother, Diana, and a look ahead at his future. The 90-minute programme was broadcast two days before Prince Harry’s autobiography ‘Spare’ was published on 10 January.

In March of 2017, Baltimore was rocked by one of the nation’s largest Police corruption scandals when seven members of the elite Gun Trace Task Force unit were federally indicted on racketeering charges. Defense attorney Ivan Bates wasn’t shocked by the news because for years he had been listening to the victims of these crimes and had been trying to bring down the corrupt sergeant. I GOT A MONSTER is the true story of a cat-and-mouse game in an upside-down world where the cops are also the robbers.

Mark Manson cuts through the crap to offer his not-giving-a-f*ck philosophy: a dose of raw, refreshing, honesty that shows us how to live more contented, grounded lives.

Xinyuan films in her personal essay film Jet Lag is her trip from Vienna to China. The hazmat suits on the aeroplane and the layers of tape sealing off each room in the quarantine hotel conjure up images of crime scenes or medical thrillers, although once she does gymnastics on the bed, the mood immediately shifts.

Featuring the breakout stars from the series and returning legends, this documentary takes viewers behind the scenes for an in-depth look at the making of the hit original series.

A deep look inside a gentrifying community in Denver, where a shooting case involving an activist becomes a window into the political machinations of urban development and the city's gang activity.

The sports documentary examines India's biggest match-fixing scandal, the icons caught in its web and the journalists who uncovered the corruption.

The ongoing relationship between the worlds of punk rock and animal rights and how the music became a breeding ground for vegan activism.

Documentary about the legendary nightclub Max's Kansas City and the New York Rock Scene of the 70s.

Around the country and across the world, the threat of a recession is looming and economic uncertainty is rising as markets, businesses and individuals adjust to a new reality: the Federal Reserve is raising interest rates and pulling back on its epic monetary experiment that started with the Great Financial Crisis. From the award-winning team behind "The Facebook Dilemma" and "Amazon Empire," the two-hour documentary "Age of Easy Money" investigates how the Fed’s experiment has changed the American economy and what it means that the era may be over.

On the night of February 21, 2018, investigative journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová, both just 27 years old, were brutally murdered in their home. It was the first targeted killing of a journalist in Slovakia's history, and shocked citizens protested on a scale not seen since the fall of communism. Kuciak was well known for covering questionable financial connections between politicians and "elite" business tycoons, namely millionaire Marián Kocner. When police failed to meaningfully investigate the prime suspect, journalists mobilized the public. Leaked files, Kuciak's posthumous reports and civic outcry led to scandalous discoveries of decades-old corruption networks involving Kocner and the police chief, high-ranking bureaucrats and the prime minister himself.

Kuwait’s constitution says that every person has the right to a job, so in some places 20 people are employed for one person’s job. In South Korea, they work so much that a policy has been introduced to turn off computers at the end of the day so that employees can’t work any more. In the US, they give up over 500 million holiday hours each year, while Amazon’s drivers are trying to form a union. Meanwhile, robots are poised to take over most jobs and put the rest of us out of work. Work is so crucial to our identity and what we spend our waking hours on that it is barely noticed anymore. A lot has happened since a group of Puritan priests invented the concept of work ethic in the 1600s, and in the 21st century the very concept of work is in many ways disintegrating. A perfect situation for a filmmaker like Swedish mastermind Erik Gandini, who travels the world to explore what the concept of work means today – if it means anything at all.

An energetic exploration of male identity via the lives, personalities, and adventures of a diverse band of men, real men across the globe all sharing the same name – James Bond. 1952. Jamaica. When author Ian Fleming needs a name for his suave, sophisticated secret agent, he steals one from an unaware birdwatcher and creates a pop-culture phenomenon about the ultimate fictional alpha male. 2022. It is the year of 007’s sixtieth anniversary onscreen and Australian filmmaker Matthew Bauer is on a global mission to discover the lasting, contrasting and very personal impacts of sharing such an identity with James Bond. From a Swedish 007 super-fan with a Nazi past, a gay New York theatre director, an African American Bond accused of murder, and two resilient women caught up in it all, Bauer’s cinematic mission is an audacious, poignant, and insightful examination of masculinity, gender, and race in the very real shadows of a movie icon.

Raw and unflinching examination of the courageous life of basketball star and social justice activist Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf. Born Chris Jackson, he overcame tremendous adversity to reach the NBA and found his true calling when he converted to Islam. His decision not to stand for the national anthem, however, turned him from prodigy to pariah. Told candidly by Abdul-Rauf himself more than 20 years later it’s the remarkable story of one man who kept the faith and paved the way for a social justice movement.

The remarkable coming-of-age story of Stephen Curry—one of the most influential, dynamic, and unexpected players in basketball history—and his rise from an undersized college player to a four-time NBA champion.

A room-scale VR creative documentary that uses multi-narrative and volumetric live capture to take the viewer on a journey into the mind of Lisa as she remembers her lost love, Erik. Within an empty void, fragments of past memories appear of their life together.

"Revival69: The Concert That Rocked the World", is the remarkable, behind-the-scenes story of how a little known music festival came together against all odds. Young, scrappy concert promoter John Brower puts his life on the line to turn his failing Toronto Rock n Roll Revival into a one-day event, later coined in rock mythology as “the second most important event in rock n’ roll history.” And it almost didn't happen. The festival united rock legends and the almost famous, but it was the 11th hour arrival of John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band that ignited a truly seminal moment for the 20,000 fans at Toronto’s Varsity Stadium, triggering Lennon's final decision to leave the Beatles forever.

Hidden camera footage augments this perilous high-stakes journey as we embed with families attempting to escape oppression, ultimately revealing a world most of us have never seen.

This documentary is a lively and colorful look back at the team’s magical season framed by a reunion of its key figures filmed in front of a live audience in Baltimore in May 2022. The story of the 2000 Baltimore Ravens, a loving, unapologetic portrait of an irrepressible cast of characters.

The undersea world has often been depicted as a dangerous place filled with lethal predators. A world where sharks are mindless eating machines. A world where the only relationship between species is that big fish eat little fish. Of course, stories of sensational danger and violent predation are seductive to wildlife film audiences. But is that what the ocean is really like?

The fate of the planet’s last untouched wilderness, the deep ocean, is under threat as a secretive organization is about to allow massive extraction of seabed metals to address the world’s energy crisis.

A short kid from a Canadian army base becomes the international pop culture darling of the 1980s—only to find the course of his life altered by a stunning diagnosis. What happens when an incurable optimist confronts an incurable disease?

A champion freediver and expert safety diver seemed destined for one another despite the different paths they took to meet at the pinnacle of the freediving world. A look at the thrilling rewards — and inescapable risks — of chasing dreams through the depths of the ocean.

She was a dichotomy – Sarah was educated, serious, intelligent, articulate, ambitious and untraditional in many ways. Minnie was uncomplicated, direct, playful and quite traditional. A young girl hailing from a small Tennessee town with big dreams of being a Shakespearian actress on the world stage was more like a delusion in the 1930’s. But she did make it on the world stage – with her recognizable costume and same opening line that never grew tiresome. The legacy she left was one of compassion, empowerment and innovation. But mostly she made us laugh. This is her story… simple, yet complicated. A permanent fixture in country music yet music was clearly not her gift.

A candid conversation between two basketball icons that explores the concept of "Greatness" and what it takes to achieve it.

An investigation of Edward Brezinski, an ambitious, charismatic Lower East Side painter hell-bent on sucess, who thwarted his own career with antics that roiled NYC’s art elite. Brezinski’s quest for fame gives an intimate portrait of the art world’s attitude towards success and failure, fame and fortune, notoriety and erasure.

It showcases the struggle of the citizens of Sarajevo during the Bosnian War and how aid worker Bill Carter's determination resulted in the enlistment of U2 to help shine a light when the world wasn't paying attention.

While navigating daily discrimination, a filmmaker who inhabits and loves her unusual body searches the world for another person like her, and explores what it takes to love oneself fiercely despite the pervasiveness of ableism.

Investigative journalist Rae de Leon travels nationwide to uncover and examine a shocking pattern: Young women tell the police they’ve been sexually assaulted, but instead of finding justice, they’re charged with the crime of making a false report, arrested, and even imprisoned by the system they believed would protect them.

James Baldwin was at once a major 20th century American author, a Civil Rights activist and, for two crucial decades, a prophetic voice calling Americans, black and white, to confront their shared racial tragedy.

The United States of America. It is Wednesday, January 6, 2021. A historic election campaign has divided the country. Now, US congressmen are gathered in parliament at the Capitol. They are about to approve the election result and declare Joe Biden the winner of the presidential election. Meanwhile, less than a mile away, the outgoing Donald Trump is speaking. Thousands of his followers are gathered. Power has been stolen, Trump repeats from the rostrum. He urges the crowd to march towards Capitol to protest. A few hours later, 5 people are killed and 141 wounded. With Trump's political godfather, Roger Stone, as the film's central character the film documents how Trump's presidential period had to find its logical end point in The Storm at the Capitol.