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Best documentaries you have seen

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13567…27

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    #62
    John the baptist
    Registered Users Posts: 23 ✭John the baptist


    The boy whose skin fell off is a very powerful piece of television but might not be for everyone.


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    #63
    Pedro K
    Registered Users Posts: 1,197 ✭✭✭Pedro K


    I thought 'The boy who's skin fell off' was a great documentary.

    Also, 'Ben: diary of a heroin addict' was interesting.


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    #64
    R P McMurphy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,129 ✭✭✭R P McMurphy


    12 o'clock boys

    Guaranteed better than any other documentary mentioned yet.


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    #65
    ceadaoin.
    Registered Users Posts: 8,110 ✭✭✭ceadaoin.


    I still well up thinking about Dear Zachary :(

    The House I Live In
    Hot Coffee
    The west Memphis three documentaries
    The One Percent
    American Addict
    The imposter


    Are worth a look too


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    #66
    Mickey H
    Registered Users Posts: 1,822 ✭✭✭Mickey H


    Not technically a documentary as such, but "Time Team" is one programme I find very interesting. I think it has been moved to BBC3 now.


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    #67
    darced
    Registered Users Posts: 7,056 ✭✭✭darced


    This post has been deleted.


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    #68
    Ihatecuddles
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,986 ✭✭✭Ihatecuddles


    King of Kong and Extasy of order are good too.

    My OH made me watch them, ones about Donkey Kong and I'm still not sure if it was a pisstake. And ones about Tetris which I'm unbeleavable at and made me want to enter a competition :o


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    #69
    RhubarbCrumble
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,174 ✭✭✭RhubarbCrumble


    John the baptist wrote: »
    The boy whose skin fell off is a very powerful piece of television but might not be for everyone.

    Agreed. Jonny Kennedy was one hell of a guy.


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    #70
    rossy1044
    Registered Users Posts: 48 ✭rossy1044


    The Two Escobars

    Part of ESPNs 30 for 30 series and charts the lives of Pablo Escobar who funded Columbian soccer with cocaine money and Andres Escobar who captained the Columbian international team. Not just the best documentary but one of the best movies I've ever seen.


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    #71
    woodoo
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,219 ✭✭✭woodoo


    I watched a documentary on 'John Bunting the bodies in the barrels', he really was a nasty effer. Worth a watch.


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    #72
    orchidsrpretty
    Registered Users Posts: 2,138 ✭✭✭orchidsrpretty


    Vinz Mesrine wrote: »
    I noticed this on netflix last night, hadn't a clue what it was about. I'll be watching it tonight

    Is it on the Irish Netflix?


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    #73
    DazMarz
    Closed Accounts Posts: 8,493 ✭✭✭DazMarz


    Oliver Stone's Untold History Of The United States

    Sure, Stone's reputation amongst some has descended to the level of "Left-Wing, Senile crank", but this documentary series is quite brilliant. Yeah, perhaps Stone's decision to narrate the thing himself was a bit much, but don't let that detract.

    Stone is showing a fairly bleak picture of the United States and her conduct from World War II up to the present day, but at the same time you can't help but think that behind it all, there isn't much else to show.

    It's all here: the CIA throwing down the gauntlet and overthrowing left-leaning governments in Asia, Europe, Africa and Europe (especially is said governments threatened US companies and interests), the débâcle of the arms race with the Soviets, how the US was utterly sinister and ruthless in its dealings at the time, how the US then squandered opportunities to capitalise on peaceful times and how the US's triumphalism makes them believe that they can do no wrong.

    It is a bit much at times when Stone paints the Soviets as innocent little lambs who did nothing but try to defend themselves; was that why they persecuted their own peoples and prevented them from leaving the Eastern Bloc by means of such monstrosities as the Berlin Wall and so on? The KGB made the CIA at times appear like a bunch of sissies. The Soviets were no angels at all, but Stone paints them in far too good a light at times, glossing over the sickening grotesqueries of the Communist countries.

    But that is a minor quibble; for the most part, this is a staggering piece of work. It does not paint the United States in a favourable light at all, and the startling lack of balls and compassion from successive Presidents from Harry Truman all the way to Barack Obama is chillingly summed up. Kennedy is portrayed as the only one who was genuinely worth a damn, but again Kennedy is a personal hero of Stone's, so that's to be expected.

    The anger and shock you'll feel at watching this documentary series (10 episodes in all) is undeniable. It fully lays out how self-serving and downright evil that certain elements of the US Government (particularly hardline conservatives, the CIA and the military) could be when it suited them. It is hard to not feel sympathy for the Soviets at times, but I just look to the evidence of the Gulags and stuff like the Berlin Wall and the assassination of Georgi Markov (he who was killed by the ricin poison umbrella) and that sympathy largely vanishes. The Soviets were as bad as the United States at times, even if it was the United States who were largely the belligerents of the time.

    Well worth a watch if you want to feel a sense of justifiable anger about something.


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    #74
    tinpib
    Registered Users Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭tinpib


    I'm a bit if a doc fiend, so definitely

    'Paradise Lost 1/2/3', followed by West of Memphis. Watch them, tell someone else about them, then spend about 2 hours talking about them next time you meet.

    Cocaine Cowboys up on youtube in HD was as exhilarating as Goodfellas for me. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJEu8QoC4hs

    I've watched 'The Four Horsemen' 3 times. All about money/financial crisis/resources etc. Brilliantly put together.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fbvquHSPJU


    Not mentioned before but the heart-warming 'Alone in the Wilderness'. This guy goes to Alaska in the 60s and builds his own house in the middle of nowhere and lives there for donkeys years.

    His carpentry skills are breathtaking.

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437806/


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    #75
    Semele
    Registered Users Posts: 753 ✭✭✭Semele


    Man on Wire- "the artistic crime of the century"

    Can't even explain why this was so amazing, it was just inspiring and mesmerising and so beautifully filmed! A fantastic mix of filmmaking and storytelling. Trailer is below:

    http://youtu.be/EIawNRm9NWM


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    #76
    Vito Corleone
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,753 ✭✭✭Vito Corleone


    "Kurt and Courtney" and "The Bridge".

    I've been meaning to watch The Act of Killing.


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    #77
    danish pasterys
    Registered Users Posts: 301 ✭✭danish pasterys


    Food matters !!! People need to watch this esp if you know anyone with a serious disease cancer etc.. Very simply explained and educating you wont regret it


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    #78
    Burky126
    Registered Users Posts: 476 ✭✭Burky126


    hungoverbunny wrote: »
    Dear Zachary

    Talk about hard-hitting.I Don't think I could bring myself to ever rewatch that one.


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    #79
    delw
    Registered Users Posts: 2,655 ✭✭✭delw


    hungoverbunny wrote: »
    Dear Zachary

    or The paradise lost trilogy of films
    Yeah that "Dear Zachary" was very good but a hard watch,would melt the hardest heart


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    #80
    tinpib
    Registered Users Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭tinpib


    Yep Dear Zachory is excellent too.

    Louis Theroux has two good posts on docs he likes.

    http://louistheroux.com/


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    #81
    Vinz Mesrine
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 2,833 ✭✭✭Vinz Mesrine


    orchidsrpretty wrote: »
    Is it on the Irish Netflix?

    Nope, the American one. Which for some reason is refusing to work for me tonight.


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    #82
    Duck's hoop
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,530 ✭✭✭Duck's hoop


    Semele wrote: »
    Man on Wire- "the artistic crime of the century"

    Can't even explain why this was so amazing, it was just inspiring and mesmerising and so beautifully filmed!


    It's the crazy swashbuckling romance of the entire project for me. And Phillipe Petit is a very charismatic nutjob.


    As mentioned already, Senna is a masterful documentary.

    One of the most powerful has to be Touching the Void. When you think about what that guy went through, his iron will is truly inspiring.


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    #83
    Yamanoto
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,489 ✭✭✭Yamanoto


    This was absolutely compelling stuff from start to finish, a US courtroom documentary in 8 parts by Jean-Xavier de Lestrade...
    When Kathleen Peterson was found dead in her Durham, NC mansion in December '01, her husband, novelist Michael Peterson, claimed she had fallen down a narrow staircase. The authorities disagreed, and Peterson was charged with first degree murder. Thereafter, director Jean-Xavier de Lestrade and his crew were given almost unrestricted access to the defendant (who remained free on bail) and his legal team, as well as to the district attorney and the prosecution crew, albeit to a lesser extent.

    There are countless meetings to map out defense strategy, dozens of interviews (including many with Peterson himself; he's not an especially sympathetic character), scenes of pre-trial home life, excerpts from Court TV coverage, and so on. The filmmakers follow the prosecution investigators to Texas, where we see a body exhumed; there's even a trip to Germany to look into a previous death in which Peterson may or may not have been involved.

    The result is both exhaustive and exhausting; indeed, it's not until the end of the fourth of the series' eight episodes (each is about 45 minutes long) that the actual trial begins. By then, various revelations about Peterson, ranging from surprising to unsavory to downright sordid, have proved once again that truth really is stranger than fiction.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2345vJZhSw

    http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuu_-MB93fOoE5db3PvJU0G7hK7kV5c2k


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    #84
    tinpib
    Registered Users Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭tinpib


    Also search on imdb for documentaries by rating and skim through them for ones that interest you.

    For popcorn TV docs you can't beat 'banged up abroad' and 'the first 48', which follows cops investigating a murder. They reckon if you don't have a strong lead within the first 48 hours you are snookered.


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    #85
    tinpib
    Registered Users Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭tinpib


    Yamanoto wrote: »
    This was absolutely compelling stuff from start to finish, a US courtroom documentary in 8 parts by Jean-Xavier de Lestrade...



    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2345vJZhSw

    http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuu_-MB93fOoE5db3PvJU0G7hK7kV5c2k


    Oh yeah, Christ. Amazing. Within 1 minute you are hooked.


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    #86
    Daveysil15
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,301 ✭✭✭Daveysil15


    Probably this one.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhJD1UrJXKM


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    #87
    Velocity_Girl
    Registered Users Posts: 77 ✭✭Velocity_Girl


    Watched a documentary called "TWA Flight 800" on US Netflix yesterday, really shocking the cover ups that happened when a plane went down just off the New York coast in 1996.
    Vinz Mesrine wrote: »
    Nope, the American one. Which for some reason is refusing to work for me tonight.

    Yeah I've been having trouble with it too all evening.


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    #88
    chakotha
    Registered Users Posts: 912 ✭✭✭chakotha


    The Ascent of Man - all on youtube
    Oliver Stone's Untold History of the United States
    The Fog of War


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    #89
    tinpib
    Registered Users Posts: 4,476 ✭✭✭tinpib


    Checked my hard disk there, some others:

    Winebago Man, very funny. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1396557/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3

    TT3D - closer to the edge. All about the Isle of Man TT races. The main fella in it would be good craic for scoops I'd say.

    Best Worst Movie, sweet and funny. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1144539/?ref_=nv_sr_1

    As mentioned before Into the Abyss is excellent but very fckued up.


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    #90
    Chun Li
    Registered Users Posts: 89 ✭✭Chun Li


    The Iceman: Confessions of a Mafia Hitman - Richard Kuklinski


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    #91
    SamAK
    Registered Users Posts: 1,094 ✭✭✭SamAK


    tinpib wrote: »
    TT3D - closer to the edge. All about the Isle of Man TT races. The main fella in it would be good craic for scoops I'd say.


    Guy Martin is a bit of a legend alright! And that documentary is amazing..



    Brian Cox's 'Wonders of the Universe' and 'Wonders of the Solar System' boggled my mind, absolutely loved them..


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