Doc Corner: The 25 Best Documentaries of 2021 (and where to see them)
The Film Experience
Thursday, January 20, 2022 at 2:01PM
By Glenn Dunks
http://thefilmexperience.net/blog/2022/1/20/doc-corner-the-25-best-documentaries-of-2021-and-where-to-se.html
Dear readers, I watch a lot of movies. Then again, what else was I supposed to do throughout yet another pandemic year with city-wide lockdowns and curfews? So I set up my home with a big TV and a 55 inch tv stand with mount so I can watch it comfortable. Which is why it was no real struggle at all to think of enough titles to make this list of the 25 best documentaries of 2021. Nor why I do not consider it the least bit excessive. Movies are great, so let’s celebrate them! Each of the films listed are deserving of your eyes, although often for very different reasons—I hope my pseudo-weekly reviews and below captions help explain why.
It was a strong year for films about artists and art more broadly. Nearly half the films on the list below are related to film, music, painting, dance and/or the people to make them. Queer themed docs were also prevalent. The longest film here is 194 minutes. The shortest is 61. There is almost a 50/50 between male and female directors across 25 films that travel the globe from sex doll factories in China to political campaigns in Zimbabwe, a jail cell in Guantanamo Bay and the streets of Harlem…
THE 25 BEST DOCUMENTARIES OF 2020
25. NO STRAIGHT LINES: THE RISE OF QUEER COMICS, Vivian Kleiman
On one hand, this is a rather simple doc. Functional and linear. But as I watched this colourfully assembled film, I was struck by how the story of queer comics is just as much the story of a revolution (+ Fun Home). Like the comics themselves, No Straight Lines educates as well as entertains, telling a story of how many found their voice through the fanciful and the erotic, the intergalactic and the down the earth. And, to me, that was something special. [Where to see it: Still in festival rotation; released limited theatrically in November]
24. THE FOREVER PRISONER, Alex Gibney
Alex Gibney’s works are often no fuss—they have to be given how prolific he is—journalistic undertakings where he reveals fact after fact about one form of American crime after another. This one is no different, boldened by first-person illustrations in the place of illegally destroyed evidence about the story of Abu Zubaydah. Used as a guinea pig by the United States government, Gibney traces his story through an embarrassment of shameful revelations. That we sit it comfort hearing about all of this only confounds the effect it has. [Where to see it: Streaming on HBOMax]
23. FILM ABOUT A FATHER WHO, Lynne Sachs
From my review: It’s a deeply personal work of biography (via autobiography), of course. … Sachs, in fact, builds her own cinematic grammar to help construct an understanding of her father, reckoning with the mistakes that lead to where they all are in 2020. [Where to see it: Streaming on the Criterion Channel]
22. FAYA DAYI, Jessica Beshir
This sombre doc from Ethiopia is perhaps a touch too elliptical in its narrative (if that’s what you could even call it). Nevertheless, Beshir’s own striking black-and-white cinematography really does lend it a quality that feels unique, reconfiguring the way we look at its own story and Africa more broadly. It’s probably no surprise I thought instantly to Ralf Schmerberg’s Hommage á Noir. This is a film of tone and poetry and images that pierce out from the dust, so much so that I am willing to extend some cultural leniency in the process. [Where to see it: Streaming on the Criterion Channel]
21. CIVIL WAR (OR, WHO DO WE THINK WE ARE), Rachel Boynton
From my review: Civil War finds interesting crevices within which to explore education and class-driven divides and the way the war’s lessons are taught and absorbed by the next generations. Spoiler alert: it’s not entirely comforting. [Where to see it: Streaming on Peacock, rentable online]
20. CAN YOU BRING IT: BILL T. JONES AND D-MAN IN THE WATERS, Tom Hurwitz, Rosalynde LeBlanc
From my review: Where others may glide over entire works like a brisk walk through a gallery, there is far more nuance to be found in the way Can You Bring It illuminates on D-Man’s thorny subtexts and subtle textures. [Where to see it: Rentable online]
19. WOODLANDS DARK AND DAYS BEWITCHED: A HISTORY OF FOLK HORROR, Kier-La Janisse
3hr+ documentaries about scary movies are surprisingly common, but this dissection of where cinema meets cultural manifestations of violence and horror is probably the best one yet. It’s academic—perhaps too much so for its own good, but this long (194 minutes!) and in-depth history is wonderfully, even wittily assembled, thoroughly detailed and richly educational. [Where to see it: Streaming on Shudder]
18. THE LOST LEONARDO, Andreas Koefoed
Sometimes documentaries can just be really entertaining. Easily the best doc I’ve seen in some time about the world of fine art world—and I have seen a few—because while it luxuriates in much of the scene’s pretentions, it also interrogates them and the absurd clash of money, ego and power that come with it. This isn’t just a film about how great it is to have money, but about what comes from it. It lost me a little bit when it got into Tenet territory, but it’s a exhilirating story. [Where to see it: Rentable online]
17. NO ORDINARY MAN, Aisling Chin-Yee and Chase Joynt
From my review: It dismantles the very politics of disclosure, and tells its story of self-discovery with empathy and tenderness while utilising film craft in a way that offers genuine inclusive insight. [Where to see it: Rentable online]
16. WITCHES OF THE ORIENT, Julien Faraut
In the depths of yet another months-long lockdown, the Tokyo Olympics actually proved to be a surprising diversion. Surprising because recent editions went by without much notice. Nestled alongside those was Witches of the Orient, a spiky (pun unintended) documentary about perhaps the best volleyball team of all time that emerged out of a Japanese factory’s recreation program and took its players to the 1984 Olympics. Julien Faraut (director of another sports doc, John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection) injects a whole lot of style including manga illustrations when he isn’t letting us luxuriate in the company of these lovely, now older champions.
15. LISTENING TO KENNY G, Penny Lane
From my review: What makes Listening to Kenny G so invigorating of a watch is because of the greater story within which this narrative is placed. One that interrogates the controversial anti-populous appeal of the multi-instrumentalist’s smooth jazz stylings from all angles. [Where to see it: Streaming on HBOMax]
14. MOMENTS LIKE THIS NEVER LAST, Cheryl Dunn
Cheryl Dunn’s second feature in ten years is a portrait of an artist who, it seems, was a complete dickhead. Which is what lends it a fascinating friction. Capturing a strange post-9/11 commercialisation of contemporary punk, it straddles a really fine line of celebrating Dash Snow, while also wanting to get underneath. Like another artist portrait further up the list, Cheryl Dunn’s follow-up to 2013’s Everybody Street is cut with the ferocious spirit of its subject, making copious use of archival footage and Dunn’s own material that, like the art world money that came his way, intoxicates. Was Snow for real, though? Who can tell…? [Where to see it: Streaming on MUBI, rentable online]
13. THE VELVET QUEEN, Marie Amigut
A nature documentary that is more concerned with patience and waiting than it is Attenborough style up-close education or the biographical anthropomorphising of last year’s unconventional Oscar winner My Octopus Teacher. Beautifully shot (although, as good as it is, Warren Ellis and Nick Cave’s score gets in the way of the sounds of nature from time to time) and richly rewarding in its conclusion. I was surprised by Marie Amigut’s debut feature. It just won the Lumière in France. [Where to see it: Currently in limited theatrical release]
12. NORTH BY CURRENT, Angelo Madsen Minax
From my review: Minax tells the story of his family in sombre tones but with affection as well as a keen eye to collage and even a slight avant-garde sensibility. [Where to see it: Streaming on PBS; still in festival rotation]
11. SUMMER OF SOUL (…OR, WHEN THE REVOLUTION COULD NOT BE TELEVISED), Questlove
From my review: …Questlove has used this opportunity (his first as a director) to not just string together the material filmed over those six weeks. Rather, he has used it to explore what made those six weeks so special in the first place. [Where to see it: Streaming on Hulu and Disney+]
10. PRESIDENT, Camilla Nielsson
Camilla Nielsson’s earlier feature, Democrats, about the political plights of Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe, was mere preparation for President, a compelling film of two starkly differing halves. In one, the hope of a new dawn for the African nation is on the horizon. Both politically and visually, it evokes the era of Obama as Nielsson’s camera captures the emphatic crowds and playbooking. Its second half, is a legal thriller that bolds, italicises and underlines just why the first half was so important. Impeccable work. [Where to see it: Currently in limited theatrical release]
9. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND, Todd Haynes
From my review: Haynes pushes the concept of a conventional bio-doc about as far as he can while remaining something your average punter might potentially watch on Apple TV+… But its Haynes’ eye as a master stylist within his knack for heightened drama that gives The Velvet Underground what makes it special. [Where to see it: Streaming on AppleTV+]
8. FLEE, Jonas Poher Rasmussen
From my review: The key to the success of Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s film is that it embraces traditional documentary form as much as it pushes it… [Where to see it: Currently in limited theatrical release]
7. LITTLE GIRL, Sébastien Lifshitz
The most recent discovery and latest addition to the list; sorry Questlove, maybe an Oscar will have to suffice instead of a place in this top ten. Sébastien Lifshitz’s direction here is among the very top highlights of the entire list, following moments major and minor in the life of Sasha, an eight-year-old transgender child. The filmmaker quite masterfully observes with humane patience and deep empathy for this family of just very nice people as they confront an all-too-unforgiving society head on. Heartbreaking and inspiring. [Where to see it: Rentable online]
6. WOJNAROWICZ: F**K YOU F*GGOT F**KER, Chris McKim
From my review: Big, boldly stylized and defiantly queer; it’s a documentary about an artist that, for once, feels truly in sync with its subject’s style. “I’m not gay as in ‘I love you’, I’m queer as in fuck off!” [Where to see it: Rentable online]
5. THE ANNOTATED FIELD GUIDE OF ULYSSES S. GRANT, Jim Finn
From my review: …Finn mixes narrated passages like Ken Burns, an avant-garde musical soundtrack, and playful battle recreations using roadside tourist trap trinkets, board games and playing cards. I found it an entrancing and divine work of experimental historical documentary. [Where to see it: Streaming on OVID]
4. ASCENSION, Jessica Kingdon
Finds stark yet cinematically witty ways to portray China’s economic shift. From sex doll factories to butler school and the pomp and circumstance of performative capitalistic excess, Kingdon uses cinematography, editing and music in some really extraordinary ways. Hard to believe this is the filmmaker’s first feature given how precise and refined it is. And in a sea of films about China, it stands tallest. [Where to see it: Streaming on Paramount+]
3. BULLETPROOF, Todd Chandler
From my review: Handler’s quite remarkable film takes something of a more removed tactic with its subject—the scourge of mass shootings in American high schools and the efforts made to avert such disasters happening in the future.
2. STATE FUNERAL, Sergei Loznitsa
One of my favourite directors delivered once again with this beast of a documentary and a true feat of editing. Perhaps even better than The Event, which I ranked as the 7th best doc of the last decade, so… you know. That’s pretty damn good! Masterfully connects the mourning for Stalin across the USSR in ways that captures both the pomp and the absurdity and the mundanity. It will most likely not be for many people, but if you have jived to Loznitsa’s wavelengths before, don’t miss it. [Where to see it: Streaming on MUBI, Rentable online]
1. PROCESSION, Robert Greene
From my review: It’s become somewhat predictable that a new Robert Greene will challenge an audience as much as it enthrals. He doesn’t exactly pick the most digestible of subject matter, but the way he comes at them is always so interesting and refreshingly unique that it becomes more than just a dour excursion into humanity’s darkest corners…. His latest, the Netflix-distributed Catholic Church abuse drama Procession is no different. More so, it’s the best documentary of the year. [Where to see it: Streaming on Netflix]
And there you go, folks. Another year of documentaries down. You can follow me on Letterboxd to see everything I watch and keep following Doc Corner for (usually) weekly reviews.