10 must-see documentaries right now

Documentaries are the most direct way film can touch reality. No inventions, no actors, no special effects — just the world as it is, told by the people who live in it. The best documentaries are every bit as gripping, emotional, and narratively satisfying as the finest fiction films. Here are ten that you shouldn't miss right now.

1. 20 Days in Mariupol (2023)

The winner of the Oscar for Best Documentary at the 2024 ceremony. AP journalist Mstyslav Chernov remained as one of the last journalists in the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol during the early weeks of the Russian invasion. The footage he and his team captured is both historic and heartbreaking. Essential viewing as a historical document and as proof of the power of documentary journalism.

2. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (2022)

Director Laura Poitras (Citizenfour) profiles artist and activist Nan Goldin, who — after her own struggle with opioid addiction — launched a campaign against the Sackler family, the donors behind major museums whose fortune was built on the addictive painkiller OxyContin. A film about art, activism, grief, and the power of money. Won the Golden Lion in Venice.

3. Free Solo (2018)

Still one of the most breathtaking documentaries ever made. Climber Alex Honnold ascends El Capitan in Yosemite without a rope, without any safety equipment — free solo. The filmmakers capture not only the climb itself (which is astonishing to watch) but also the psychological and relational complexity of Honnold's life. Won the Oscar for Best Documentary.

4. The Last of Us: Making the Show (2023)

For those who followed HBO's mega-series: this making-of offers a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at one of the most expensive television productions ever made. How was the game brought to the screen? How were Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey guided through their performances? A documentary for anyone interested in production and adaptation.

5. My Imaginary Country (2022)

Chilean documentary filmmaker Patricio Guzmán (Nostalgia for the Light) follows the social uprisings in Chile in 2019–2020. A political and personal film about a country trying to process its past while renegotiating its future. Guzmán is one of the greatest living documentary filmmakers.

6. Navalny (2022)

Director Daniel Roher followed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny as he investigated his own poisoning with Novichok. The film offers not only a portrait of Navalny as a person, but also a real-time thriller in which Navalny and his team make live contact with the FSB agent who tried to kill him. Won the Oscar for Best Documentary in 2023. Navalny's death in a Russian prison camp in 2024 makes the film even more haunting.

7. Hollywoodgate (2023)

Austrian filmmaker Ibrahim Nash'at gained unique access to senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan in 2021, shortly after the takeover. He films the occupation of the abandoned American military base in Kabul, the handling of left-behind weapons systems, and the daily lives of Taliban officials. A deeply unsettling, politically complex film that defies easy categorisation.

8. To Kill a Tiger (2023)

A Canadian co-production about a father in India who pursues a legal case following the rape of his thirteen-year-old daughter — something virtually unheard of in his community. A film about courage, patriarchy, and justice that connects the personal and political in a way that stays with you long after the credits roll. Oscar-nominated.

Why documentaries in the cinema?

Many documentaries go straight to streaming and are never shown on the big screen. But for the major, visually rich documentaries — Free Solo, 20 Days in Mariupol, All the Beauty and the Bloodshed — a cinema screening is a fundamentally different experience. The large screen amplifies the emotional weight. And the collective experience — a hundred people simultaneously watching breathlessly as Alex Honnold climbs El Capitan — is irreplaceable.