Kingdom of the white wolf - a documentary on national geographic. My 1l yr old is fascinated with wolves and this one was quite a learning experience.
Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
351–360 of 568 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#352Surprised nobody else posted this one - "Meet the Stans" a great four part travel documentary about Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#353Free Solo, It's the documentary of Alex Honnold in his preparation and eventual accomplishment of climbing the "El Capitan" without ropes
That thing it's awesome, you know the guy ends up ok, but the journey made my hands sweat like crazy
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#354The Up Series[0]. It's a series that follows a group from children from age 7 through old age, and it's still going (in theory - the creator died last year). Seeing entire lives compressed into a few hours was very impactful to me.
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#355I only see Hoop Dreams mentioned once, without comment, so: It's a 3-hour doc about two urban black teenagers who are basketball phenoms, and are recruited by a white suburban high school to play for them. Three hours is long enough for an extended meditation on what their lives were like, and what they hoped to get out of basketball. Read the Roger Ebert review of it.
It's not mentioned because OP asked for documentaries from the last 4 years, and Hoop Dreams must be over a quarter century old at this point. Great film though.
Saw that, but a lot of the other answers were for older flicks, too.
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#356On the lighter side "Side by Side" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2014338/ about the digital age replacing film. One of the outtakes is pretty inspiring https://youtu.be/lepOQ2KfDwo
On the serious side, Don't Get Sick After June: American Indian Healthcare https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1770673/ rather depressing
Dakota 38 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2838564/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pX6FBSUyQI why Lincoln is taught a bit differently in my old high school
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#357The Long Way Round (2004) - a British television series documenting the 19,000-mile (31,000 km) journey of Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman from London to New York via Eurasia on motorcycles. It is a lot of fun and covers incredible terrain and the trials and triumphs of lesser travelled roads and countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Way_Round
There are an additional two series, Long Way Down (2007), Scotland to Capetown and Long Way Up (2020) over South and North America, both fantastic follow ons! Enjoy.
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#358The Gatekeepers (2012) [1] a very rare documentary and interviews six former Shin Bet heads. They talked about Israel conflicts with a lot of independence.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gatekeepers_%28film%29
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#359The greatest documentary to me is not a film but a series - The Ascent of Man by Jacob Bronowski. It charts the cultural and technological milestones that brought humanity to where it is today. Well, the 1970s rather than today, since it is quite old. However don't let that put you off! It is a BBC documentary of the highest calibre. David Attenborough commissioned its production. Bronowski is an incredible, if unusu…
That moment when he stands in front of the remnants of Auschwitz, kneels down, reaches into the sludge of ashes and says, “We need to touch people”.
It would be an Ask HN in and of itself to ask: What broadcaster today, YouTube or otherwise, comes even close in education, trust in the intelligence of their audience, and sheer balls?
Re: Ask HN: What are some of the best documentaries you've seen?
#360Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://youtu.be/x1bX3F7uTrg obligatry response whenever anything by Adam Curtis is offered up. Sorry, I'm largely of the opinion that it is (well made) boomer-aimed catastrophe porn designed to give the viewer a smug sense of having "esoteric knowledge".
> boomer-aimed catastrophe porn designed to give the viewer a smug sense of having "esoteric knowledge" I'll just balance it out with some TED optimism porn.
opens arms