The Best Documentaries of All Time
Nonfiction cinema's canon, measured: every documentary in our library ranked by composite score across 20+ lists, awards and polls.
The documentary is cinema's founding mode — the Lumières were documentarians before anyone was a dramatist — and its canon spans Flaherty's staged ethnography, Vertov's camera-eye manifesto Man with a Movie Camera (a fixture of the Sight & Sound top ten), and the direct-cinema revolution of the Maysles and Frederick Wiseman. The modern era belongs to the essayists and observers: Errol Morris's interrogations, Michael Moore's polemics, and Wang Bing's durational portraits of China.
A Man Escaped (1956) leads with a composite score of 3.35. Top 100 of 490 films in our library.
Masters of the genre
- Michael Moore
4 films · Roger & Me
- Jean-Luc Godard
5 films · The Image Book
- Claude Lanzmann
3 films · Shoah
- Errol Morris
7 films · The Thin Blue Line
- Abbas Kiarostami
3 films · Close-Up
- Agnès Varda
4 films · The Gleaners and I
- 1A Man Escaped1956 · Robert Bresson · France · drama, documentary, war3.35
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1956 #1 · Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #41 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #95
- 2Shoah1985 · Claude Lanzmann · France · documentary3.18
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #27 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1985 #1 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1989 #1
- 3Close-Up1990 · Abbas Kiarostami · Iran / France · documentary3.01
Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #9 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #17 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1991 #5
- 4The Image Book2018 · Jean-Luc Godard · Switzerland / France · documentary2.74
Palme d'Or winner 2018 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2019 #1 · Film Comment year-end poll 2019 #18
- 5The Queen2006 · Stephen Frears · United Kingdom / France / Italy · biography, drama, documentary2.27
BAFTA Best Film winner 2007 · Oscar Best Picture nominee 2006 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2007 #4
- 6Once Upon a Time in America1984 · Sergio Leone · United States / Italy / France · crime, drama, thriller2.14
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1984 #1 · Siskel's annual top 10 1984 #1 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #157
- 7Man with a Movie Camera1929 · Dziga Vertov · Soviet Union · documentary, silent2.13
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #9 · Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #30 · TIME All-TIME 100
- 8Afternoons of Solitude2024 · Albert Serra · Spain / France / Portugal · documentary2.11
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2025 #1 · San Sebastián Golden Shell winner 2024 · Film Comment year-end poll 2025 #6
- 9Dog Day Afternoon1975 · Sidney Lumet · United States · crime, action, drama2.04
Oscar Best Picture nominee 1975 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1976 #5 · National Film Registry (inducted 2009)
- 10Hoop Dreams1994 · Steve James · United States · documentary2.01
Ebert's annual top 10 1994 #1 · Siskel's annual top 10 1994 #1 · National Film Registry (inducted 2005)
- 11Roger & Me1989 · Michael Moore · United States · documentary1.99
TIFF People's Choice winner 1989 · Siskel's annual top 10 1989 #2 · National Film Registry (inducted 2013)
- 12The Silent World1956 · Jacques Cousteau, Louis Malle · France / Italy · documentary1.97
Palme d'Or winner 1956 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1956 #9 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 13Fahrenheit 9/112004 · Michael Moore · United States · documentary1.97
Palme d'Or winner 2004 · Film Comment year-end poll 2004 #15 · Sarris's annual top 10 2004 #4
- 14Zodiac2007 · David Fincher · United States · thriller, crime, drama1.82
Film Comment year-end poll 2007 #3 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2007 #5 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #19
- 15Olympia1938 · Leni Riefenstahl · German Reich · documentary1.76
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1940 #1 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1940 #5 · TIME All-TIME 100
- 16Crumb1994 · Terry Zwigoff · United States · documentary1.70
Siskel's annual top 10 1995 #1 · Ebert's annual top 10 1995 #2 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 17Sans Soleil1983 · Chris Marker · France · documentary1.52
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #59 · Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #72 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1989 #3
- 18All the Beauty and the Bloodshed2022 · Laura Poitras · United States · documentary, biography1.52
Venice Golden Lion winner 2022 · Film Comment year-end poll 2022 #6 · Criterion Collection spine #1210
- 19City Hall2020 · Frederick Wiseman · United States · documentary1.50
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2020 #1 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2021 #2
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- 21Apollo 131995 · Ron Howard · United States · drama, documentary, adventure1.46
Oscar Best Picture nominee 1995 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1995 #10 · National Film Registry (inducted 2023)
- 22Bloody Sunday2002 · Paul Greengrass · Ireland / United Kingdom · drama, documentary, war1.42
Berlin Golden Bear winner 2002 · Film Comment year-end poll 2002 #15 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
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- 24The Gleaners and I2000 · Agnès Varda · France · documentary1.29
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #67 · Film Comment year-end poll 2001 #9 · Sarris's annual top 10 2001 #4
- 25In This World2002 · Michael Winterbottom · United Kingdom · drama, documentary1.20
Berlin Golden Bear winner 2003 · Film Comment year-end poll 2003 #34
- 26Grizzly Man2005 · Werner Herzog · United States · documentary, biography1.16
Film Comment year-end poll 2005 #5 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2005 #8 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #69
- 27Harlan County, USA1976 · Barbara Kopple · United States · documentary1.12
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #225 · National Film Registry (inducted 1990) · Siskel's annual top 10 1977 #6
- 28Faces Places2017 · Agnès Varda, JR · France · documentary1.09
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2018 #7 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #23 · Film Comment year-end poll 2017 #8
- 29Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks2003 · Wang Bing · China · documentary1.04
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2004 #2 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #157
- 30News from Home1976 · Chantal Akerman · France / Belgium / Germany · documentary1.01
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #52 · Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #72
- 31
- 32Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director1975 · Kaneto Shindō · Japan · documentary1.00
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (Japanese) 1975 #1
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- 34Caesar Must Die2012 · Vittorio Taviani, Paolo Taviani · Italy · documentary, drama1.00
Berlin Golden Bear winner 2012
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- 39Woodstock1970 · Michael Wadleigh, Thelma Schoonmaker, Martin Scorsese · United States · documentary, musical0.99
National Film Registry (inducted 1996) · Ebert's annual top 10 1970 #5 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 40Waltz with Bashir2008 · Ari Folman · Israel / France / Germany · documentary, war, animation0.99
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2008 #6 · Film Comment year-end poll 2008 #8 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2009 #8
- 41The Thin Blue Line1988 · Errol Morris · United States · documentary0.95
National Film Registry (inducted 2001) · Hoberman's annual top 10 1988 #4 · Siskel's annual top 10 1988 #6
- 42Paris Is Burning1990 · Jennie Livingston · United States · documentary0.93
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #196 · National Film Registry (inducted 2016) · Criterion Collection spine #1018
- 43Bowling for Columbine2002 · Michael Moore · United States / Germany / Canada · documentary0.91
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2003 #4 · Sarris's annual top 10 2002 #2 · Criterion Collection spine #928
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- 45A Man Vanishes1967 · Shohei Imamura · Japan · documentary0.83
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (Japanese) 1967 #2 · Film Comment year-end poll 2012 #31
- 46The Sorrow and the Pity1969 · Marcel Ophuls · France / Germany · documentary0.83
Siskel's annual top 10 1972 #2 · Ebert's annual top 10 1972 #6 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 47Stowaway in the Sky1960 · Albert Lamorisse · France · documentary0.81
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1961 #2 · Kurosawa's 100 favorite films
- 48The Fog of War2003 · Errol Morris · United States · documentary, biography0.80
Film Comment year-end poll 2003 #6 · National Film Registry (inducted 2019) · Hoberman's annual top 10 2003 #4
- 49Tokyo Olympiad1965 · Kon Ichikawa · Japan · documentary0.79
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (Japanese) 1965 #2 · Criterion Collection spine #155
- 50The Naked City1948 · Jules Dassin · United States · crime, mystery, documentary0.77
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1949 #5 · National Film Registry (inducted 2007) · Criterion Collection spine #380
- 51The Act of Killing2012 · Joshua Oppenheimer, Christine Cynn · United Kingdom / Norway / Denmark · documentary0.77
Film Comment year-end poll 2013 #4 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #20
- 52Dream of Light1992 · Víctor Erice · Spain · documentary, drama0.77
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1993 #5 · Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #243
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- 54México, la revolución congelada1973 · Raymundo Gleyzer · Argentina · documentary0.75
Locarno Golden Leopard winner 1971
- 55The Double Steps2011 · Isaki Lacuesta · Switzerland / Spain · drama, documentary0.75
San Sebastián Golden Shell winner 2011
- 56
- 57Between Two Waters2018 · Isaki Lacuesta · Spain · documentary, drama0.75
San Sebastián Golden Shell winner 2018
- 58Into the Wild2007 · Sean Penn · United States · drama, documentary, biography0.74
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2008 #4 · Empire 500 (2008) #473 · Ebert's annual top 10 2007 #10
- 59Gates of Heaven1978 · Errol Morris · United States · documentary0.74
Ebert's annual top 10 1981 #3 · Siskel's annual top 10 1981 #5 · Criterion Collection spine #751
- 60The Last Waltz1978 · Martin Scorsese · United States · documentary0.73
National Film Registry (inducted 2019) · Empire 500 (2008) #344 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 61Salesman1969 · Albert Maysles, David Maysles · United States · documentary0.72
National Film Registry (inducted 1992) · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Siskel's annual top 10 1970 #7
- 62Fast, Cheap & Out of Control1997 · Errol Morris · United States · drama, documentary0.71
Sarris's annual top 10 1997 #3 · Ebert's annual top 10 1997 #6 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 63Medium Cool1969 · Haskell Wexler · United States · documentary, drama0.70
Ebert's annual top 10 1969 #2 · National Film Registry (inducted 2003) · Criterion Collection spine #658
- 64United 932006 · Paul Greengrass · United Kingdom / United States / France · drama, documentary, biography0.69
Film Comment year-end poll 2006 #8 · Empire 500 (2008) #186 · Ebert's annual top 10 2006 #6
- 65In Cold Blood1967 · Richard Brooks · United States · drama, documentary, crime0.69
National Film Registry (inducted 2008) · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Criterion Collection spine #781
- 66Sherman's March1985 · Ross McElwee · United States · documentary, biography0.67
National Film Registry (inducted 2000) · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Hoberman's annual top 10 1986 #7
- 67Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse1991 · George Hickenlooper, Eleanor Coppola · United States · documentary0.67
Siskel's annual top 10 1991 #1 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 68Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills1996 · Joe Berlinger, Bruce Sinofsky · United States · documentary0.67
Sarris's annual top 10 1996 #1 · Siskel's annual top 10 1996 #7
- 69To Be and to Have2002 · Nicolas Philibert · France · documentary0.66
Sarris's annual top 10 2003 #3 · Film Comment year-end poll 2003 #19 · Kehr's annual top 10 2003 #6
- 70The Wrong Man1956 · Alfred Hitchcock · United States · drama, film-noir, crime0.65
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1957 #4 · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 71The Five Obstructions2003 · Jørgen Leth, Lars von Trier · Denmark / Switzerland / Belgium · documentary, drama0.65
Sarris's annual top 10 2004 #1 · Kehr's annual top 10 2004 #9
- 72Lessons of Darkness1992 · Werner Herzog · Germany / United Kingdom / France · documentary0.64
Hoberman's annual top 10 1995 #1 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1999 #null
- 73Nanook of the North1922 · Robert J. Flaherty · United States / France · documentary, drama, silent0.63
National Film Registry (inducted 1989) · Criterion Collection spine #33 · Roger Ebert's Great Movies
- 74Children Hand in Hand1963 · Susumu Hani · Japan · documentary0.63
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (Japanese) 1948 #2
- 75The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On1987 · Kazuo Hara · Japan · documentary0.63
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (Japanese) 1987 #2
- 76S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine2003 · Rithy Panh · France / Cambodia · documentary, war0.63
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2004 #2
- 77Symbiopsychotaxiplasm1968 · William Greaves · United States · documentary0.63
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #169 · National Film Registry (inducted 2015)
- 78Nostalgia for the Light2010 · Patricio Guzmán · France / Chile · documentary0.62
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #243 · Film Comment year-end poll 2011 #16
- 79Number Two1975 · Jean-Luc Godard, Anne-Marie Miéville · France · documentary0.62
Hoberman's annual top 10 1977 #2 · Kehr's annual top 10 1977 #5 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 80My Voyage to Italy1999 · Martin Scorsese · United States / Italy · documentary0.61
Sarris's annual top 10 2001 #1 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 81Boys Don't Cry1999 · Kimberly Peirce · United States · romance, drama, documentary0.61
National Film Registry (inducted 2019) · Ebert's annual top 10 1999 #4 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 82Leviathan2012 · Lucien Castaing-Taylor, Véréna Paravel · France / United States · documentary0.60
Film Comment year-end poll 2013 #6 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #66
- 83American Utopia2020 · Spike Lee · United States · biography, documentary0.59
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2021 #4 · Criterion Collection spine #1294
- 84Night and Fog1956 · Alain Resnais · France · documentary0.59
Sarris's annual top 10 1960 #2 · Criterion Collection spine #197 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 85The Exiles1961 · Kent Mackenzie · United States · documentary0.57
Film Comment year-end poll 2008 #19 · National Film Registry (inducted 2009) · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 86In Jackson Heights2015 · Frederick Wiseman · United States · documentary0.56
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2018 #9 · Film Comment year-end poll 2015 #13
- 87Streetwise1984 · Martin Bell · United States · documentary0.56
Siskel's annual top 10 1985 #3 · Criterion Collection spine #1079 · Ebert's annual top 10 1985 #9
- 88The House Is Black1962 · Forugh Farrokhzad · Iran · documentary0.56
Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #101 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
- 89The Conquest of Everest1953 · George Lowe · United Kingdom · documentary0.55
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1954 #5 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
- 90Dont Look Back1967 · D. A. Pennebaker · United States · documentary0.53
National Film Registry (inducted 1998) · Criterion Collection spine #786 · Sarris's annual top 10 1998 #null
- 9149 Up2005 · Michael Apted · United Kingdom · documentary0.51
Sarris's annual top 10 2006 #2 · Film Comment year-end poll 2006 #37
- 92Stop Making Sense1984 · Jonathan Demme · United States · documentary0.50
National Film Registry (inducted 2021) · NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies
- 93Sacco and Vanzetti1971 · Giuliano Montaldo · Italy / France · drama, documentary0.50
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1972 #3
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- 95The Kid Stays in the Picture2002 · Nanette Burstein · United States · documentary0.50
Sarris's annual top 10 2002 #1
- 96
- 97Cloverfield2008 · Matt Reeves · United States · action, sci-fi, fantasy0.50
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2008 #3
- 98Koyaanisqatsi1982 · Godfrey Reggio · United States · documentary0.50
National Film Registry (inducted 2000) · Criterion Collection spine #640 · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies
- 99Sobibor, October 14, 1943, 4 p.m.2001 · Claude Lanzmann · France · documentary0.49
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2001 #8 · Hoberman's annual top 10 2001 #6
- 100The Memory of Justice1976 · Marcel Ophuls · France / United Kingdom / United States · documentary0.48
Kehr's annual top 10 1977 #2 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
The documentary carries a burden no fiction film bears: it claims the things on screen actually happened. That claim has been contested from the form's first frame, and the contest — not any settled truth — is what this page ranks. Any list of the best documentaries has to decide first what a documentary is; ours lets the data draw the line, then tells you exactly where it drew it.
The lie at the founding
John Grierson coined the word in a February 1926 review of Robert J. Flaherty's Moana, defining the form as the "creative treatment of actuality" — a definition with the scandal built in. Flaherty's Nanook of the North (1922), the founding monument, was heavily staged: he had his subjects hunt a walrus with a harpoon rather than the shotgun at hand, and built a roofless igloo so the camera could see inside. Dziga Vertov answered from the Soviet side with the opposite faith — that the mechanical eye, freely edited, could out-see the human one — and his Man with a Movie Camera (1929) remains the manifesto of that position. The genre's two founders, in short, disagreed about everything except that recording is never neutral.
From observation to argument
The 1960s brought light, portable cameras and synchronized sound, and with them the direct-cinema wager that you could simply watch: Robert Drew, Richard Leacock, the Maysles brothers' Salesman (1969), and above all Frederick Wiseman, still filming American institutions into the 2020s. The modern era swung back toward authored argument. Errol Morris's The Thin Blue Line (1988) readmitted staging as stylized reenactment; Michael Moore put the director's own interpretation at the center with Roger & Me (1989) and took the polemic to blockbuster scale with Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004). Alongside them runs the essay tradition — Chris Marker's Sans Soleil (1983), Agnès Varda's The Gleaners and I (2000) — and the durational patience of Wang Bing's portraits of China.
How to read our list
The ranking is by composite score, and its top is telling: not a vérité classic but Robert Bresson's reenacted prison break A Man Escaped (1956) leads at 3.35, with Claude Lanzmann's testimony epic Shoah (1985) just behind at 3.18 and Jean-Luc Godard's late essay-collage The Image Book (2018) close by at 2.74 — reenactment, witness and montage, the form's contending poles, in the top seats. Membership is a genre tag from our data pipeline: Wikidata's genre labels are mapped into a documentary bucket, and that mapping deliberately sweeps in docufiction and docudrama. This is why dramatizations of the record — The Queen (2006), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), Zodiac (2007) — sit beside strict nonfiction here: the tag draws the same blurry border Grierson's definition never managed to close. Read those entries as the genre's disputed frontier rather than a bug. And note the founders' fates: Man with a Movie Camera scores 2.13 while Nanook of the North sits at 0.63 — a century on, the canon has quietly sided with Vertov.