A documentary film is a non-fictional motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". The American author and media analyst Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in terms of "a filmmaking practice, a cinematic tradition, and mode of audience reception [that remains] a practice without clear boundaries".
Errol Mark Morris is an American film director known for documentaries that interrogate the epistemology of their subjects, and the invention of the Interrotron. In 2003, his The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. His film The Thin Blue Line placed fifth on a Sight & Sound poll of the greatest documentaries ever made. Morris is known for making films about unusual subjects; Fast, Cheap & Out of Control interweaves the stories of an animal trainer, a topiary gardener, a robot scientist, and a naked mole-rat specialist.
Werner Herzog is a German filmmaker, actor, opera director, and author. Regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema, his films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with unusual talents in obscure fields, or individuals in conflict with nature. His style involves avoiding storyboards, emphasizing improvisation, and placing his cast and crew into real situations mirroring those in the film they are working on.
Les Blank was an American documentary filmmaker best known for his portraits of American traditional musicians.
Sheffield DocFest is an international documentary festival and industry marketplace held annually in Sheffield, England.
The Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival is the largest documentary festival in North America. The event takes place annually in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The 27th edition of the festival took place online throughout May and June 2020. In addition to the annual festival, Hot Docs owns and operates the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema, administers multiple production funds, and runs year-round screening programs including Doc Soup and Hot Docs Showcase.
International Documentary Association (IDA), founded in 1982, is a non-profit 501(c)(3) that promotes nonfiction filmmakers, and is dedicated to increasing public awareness for the documentary genre. Their major program areas are: Advocacy, Filmmaker Services, Education, and Public Programs and Events.
Encounters at the End of the World is a 2007 American documentary film by Werner Herzog about Antarctica and the people who choose to spend time there. It was released in North America on June 11, 2008, and distributed by ThinkFilm. At the 81st Academy Awards, the film was nominated for Best Documentary Feature.
Joshua Lincoln Oppenheimer is an American film director based in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is known for his Oscar-nominated films The Act of Killing (2012) and The Look of Silence (2014). Oppenheimer was a 1997 Marshall Scholar and a 2014 recipient of the MacArthur fellowship.
The Documentary Organization of Canada (DOC) is a non-profit organization representing the interests of independent documentary filmmakers in Canada. It was founded as the Canadian Independent Film Caucus (CIFC) in the 1980s.
André Felix Vitus Singer is a British documentary film-maker and an anthropologist. He is currently Chief Creative Officer of Spring Films Ltd of London, a Professorial Research Associate at the London School of Oriental and African Studies, and emeritus president of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland where he was president from 2014 to 2018.
Into the Abyss is a 2011 documentary film written and directed by Werner Herzog. It is about capital punishment, and focuses on a triple homicide that occurred in Montgomery County, Texas, in 2001. In the film, Herzog interviews the two young men convicted of the crime, Michael Perry and Jason Burkett, as well as family members and acquaintances of the victims and criminals, and individuals who have taken part in executions in Texas. The primary focus of the film is not the details of the case or the question of Michael and Jason's guilt or innocence, and, although Herzog's voice can be heard as he conducts the interviews, there is a minimal amount of narration, and he never appears onscreen, unlike in many of his films.
The Act of Killing is a 2012 documentary film directed by Joshua Oppenheimer, with Christine Cynn and an anonymous Indonesian co-directing. The film follows individuals who participated in the Indonesian mass killings of 1965–66, wherein alleged communists and people opposed to the New Order regime were tortured and killed, with the killers, many becoming gangsters, still in power throughout the country. The film was mostly filmed in Medan, North Sumatra, following the executioner Anwar Congo and his acquaintances as they, upon Oppenheimer's request, re-enact their killings and talk about their actions openly, also following Congo's psychological journey facing the topic.
The 63rd annual Berlin International Film Festival took place in Berlin, Germany, between 7 and 17 February 2013. Chinese film director Wong Kar-wai was announced as the president of the jury and his film The Grandmaster was the opening film of the festival.
A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates for, a revolution. The term revolutionary can also be used as an adjective to describe something producing a major and sudden impact on society.
Signe Byrge Sørensen is a Danish film producer. She is the head of and co-founder of the film production company Final Cut for Real in Copenhagen, Denmark. Sørensen and film director Joshua Oppenheimer were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for the 2013 film The Act of Killing. She was also the producer to the critically acclaimed documentary The Look of Silence. Signe Byrge Sørensen a member of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Danish Film Academy. In 2022, she produced the animated documentary film Flee and was nominated in Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and Best Animated Feature categories.
The Look of Silence is a 2014 internationally co-produced documentary film directed by Joshua Oppenheimer about the Indonesian mass killings of 1965–66. The film is a companion piece to his 2012 documentary The Act of Killing. Executive producers were Werner Herzog, Errol Morris, and Andre Singer. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 88th Academy Awards.
Ruth Lingford is an independent animator. Since 2005, she has taught at the Harvard University. She now holds a position as faculty member in the visual and environmental studies, where she is senior lecturer and director of undergraduate studies. She previously taught at the Royal College of Art and the National Film and Television School, UK. Before investing herself in animation, she was an occupational therapist working with the elders and people suffering from mental disorders. Lingford completed a BA in fine arts and art history at the Middlesex Polytechnic from 1987 to 1990 and a MA at the Royal College of Art until 1992. In 2008, she received an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from the University of Wolverhampton.
Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds is a 2020 documentary film directed by Werner Herzog and Clive Oppenheimer. The film explores the cultural, spiritual, and scientific impact of meteorites, and the craters they create around the globe.
