Tag Archives: documentary film

Twenty of my favorite documentaries

I was chatting with one of my fiancee’s cousins this morning, and, not being able to come up with a conventional Top X list of documentary films, I devised this idea. (I used to be quite involved in the documentary film world before law and info science school, if you’ll believe that.)

Anyway, it’s a list of twenty of my favorite documentaries, but with a twist — each documentary having a documentary doppelganger. That is, one documentary you may have heard of (or even seen described as “classic”) and one that is related, but that you might not have heard of. I’ll leave it to you to figure out how each pair is connected. Beyond that, enjoy!

  • 1. Night and Fog
  • 1a. Triumph of the Will
  • 2. The Thin Blue Line
  • 2a. Gates of Heaven
  • 3. When We Were Kings
  • 3a. Hoop Dreams
  • 4. Sherman’s March
  • 4a. The Rough South of Larry Brown
  • 5. American Movie
  • 5a. Mule Skinner Blues
  • 6. Don’t Look Back
  • 6a. Gimme Shelter
  • 7. High School
  • 7a. Hands on a Hard Body
  • 8. Roger & Me
  • 8a. Salesman
  • 9. The Civil War
  • 9a. Hearts and Minds
  • 10. Man With a Movie Camera
  • 10a. Sans Soleil

Tweet me @kirschsubjudice if you want to argue, cajole, etc., etc.