The Telluride Film Festival (TFF) is a film festival held annually in Telluride, Colorado, during Labor Day weekend. The 51st edition took place on August 30–September 4, 2024.
Lucy Walker is an English film director. She has directed the feature documentaries Devil's Playground (2002), Blindsight (2006), Waste Land (2010), Countdown to Zero (2010), The Crash Reel (2013), Buena Vista Social Club: Adios (2017), Bring Your Own Brigade (2021), and Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa (2023). She has also directed the short films The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom (2011) and The Lion's Mouth Opens (2014). Waste Land was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary.
Julia is a 2021 American documentary film directed and produced by Julie Cohen and Betsy West. The documentary chronicles the life of Julia Child. Brian Grazer and Ron Howard serve as executive producers.
The 2022 Sundance Film Festival took place from January 20 to 30, 2022. Due to COVID-19 pandemic protocol, it was initially intended to be an in-person/virtual hybrid festival, but on January 5, 2022, it was announced that the in-person components would be scrapped in favor of a wholly virtual festival due to the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant. The first lineup of competition films was announced on December 9, 2021.
Pray Away is a 2021 American documentary film produced and directed by Kristine Stolakis. It follows survivors of conversion therapy, and former leaders. Jason Blum and Ryan Murphy serve as executive producers.
The First Wave is a 2021 American documentary film, directed and produced by Matthew Heineman. The film follows a hospital in New York City, as it battles the COVID-19 pandemic. Alex Gibney serves as an executive producer.
Becoming Cousteau is a 2021 American documentary film directed and produced by Liz Garbus. It follows the life and career of Jacques Cousteau.
Citizen Ashe is a 2021 American-British documentary film directed by Rex Miller and Sam Pollard revolving around the life and career of Arthur Ashe. Alex Gibney and John Legend were two of the executive producers.
The Rescue is a 2021 documentary film directed and produced by Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin. It follows the Tham Luang cave rescue, a 2018 mission that saved a junior association football team from an underwater cave.
Procession is a 2021 American documentary film, directed and edited by Robert Greene. It follows six men, who suffered abuse by priests, looking for peace.
Occupied City is a 2023 documentary film directed and produced by Steve McQueen and based on the book Atlas of an Occupied City, Amsterdam 1940-1945 by Bianca Stigter. It is narrated by Melanie Hyams. The film is a co-production between the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and the United States. It had its world premiere at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival on 17 May 2023 as a special screening, where it competed for the L'Œil d'or. It was released by A24 in the United States on 25 December 2023 and in the United Kingdom/Ireland on 9 February 2024.
Navalny is a 2022 American documentary film directed by Daniel Roher. The film revolves around Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny and events related to his poisoning. It was produced by HBO Max and CNN Films. The film premiered on January 25, 2022 at the Sundance Film Festival, where it received critical and audience acclaim and won the Audience Award in the US Documentary competition and the Festival Favorite Award. It also won the Best Documentary Feature at the 95th Academy Awards, won the award for Best Political Documentary at the 7th Critics' Choice Documentary Awards and picked up best documentary at the 76th BAFTA awards ceremony.
The Territory is a 2022 internationally co-produced documentary film directed by Alex Pritz. It follows a young Indigenous leader of the Uru-eu-wau-wau people fighting back against farmers, colonizers and settlers who encroach on a protected area of the Amazon Rainforest. Filmed on location in Brazil from 2018 to 2020, the film utilizes almost exclusively on-the-ground, primary source material, including footage produced directly by the Uru-eu-wau-wau. Darren Aronofsky serves as a producer under his Protozoa Pictures banner.
Retrograde is a 2022 American documentary film directed by Matthew Heineman that covers events that took place during the final nine months of America's 20-year war in Afghanistan. It had its U.S. premiere at the Telluride Film Festival on September 3, 2022, and had its Canadian debut at the Vancouver International Film Festival on October 2, 2022. It was released in select theaters in the United States starting November 11, 2022, by National Geographic Documentary Films and Picturehouse and was later made available on various streaming platforms. The film received critical acclaim, was nominated for the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing in the Documentary Category at the Producers Guild of America Awards, and won the Doc NYC award at the annual documentary film festival. The film also faced criticism for failing to adequately protect the identities of its subjects.
Nickel Boys is a 2024 American historical drama film based on the 2019 novel The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. It was directed by RaMell Ross, who co-wrote the screenplay with Joslyn Barnes, and stars Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson, Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs, and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor. The story follows two African American boys, Elwood and Turner, who are sent to an abusive reform school called the Nickel Academy in 1960s Florida. The film is inspired by the historic reform school in Florida called the Dozier School for Boys, which was notorious for abusive treatment of students.
Shane Boris, is a film producer and the founder of Cottage M, an independent production house. Boris was nominated for Best Documentary Feature for The Edge of Democracy at the 92nd Academy Awards in 2020. Later, in 2022, Boris produced two acclaimed documentaries, Fire of Love and Navalny, both securing Oscar nominations and marking him the first producer since Walt Disney to be nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature in the same year. Unlike Disney, Boris not only garnered nominations but also won the Oscar in 2023 for Navalny. This dual accomplishment of two nominations and a win set a new record in film history.
The Piano Lesson is a 2024 American drama film directed by Malcolm Washington, who co-wrote the screenplay with Virgil Williams. It is an adaptation of the 1987 play by August Wilson. It stars Samuel L. Jackson, John David Washington, Ray Fisher, Michael Potts, Erykah Badu, Skylar Aleece Smith, Danielle Deadwyler, and Corey Hawkins.
The Pigeon Tunnel is a 2023 British documentary film directed by Errol Morris. It follows the life and career of John le Carré.
The Mission is a 2023 American documentary film directed and produced by Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss. It explores the death of American missionary John Allen Chau, who was killed by arrows during a self-initiated mission involving an indigenous group of the Andaman Islands, the Sentinelese.
Fly is a 2024 documentary film, directed by Christina Clusiau and Shaul Schwarz. The film's plot explores three romantic couples entwined in the world's most dangerous sport.
