The best documentaries of 2023
One of 2023’s biggest cinema trends was the way accomplished filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Greta Gerwig, Wes Anderson, Christopher Nolan, and many more delivered some of the most creatively and commercially successful work of their careers. There was just something in the air this year, as one major artist after another took big swings that connected.
The same was true in the world of nonfiction film. Half of the movies on this list were directed by filmmakers already responsible for some of the best documentaries of this era: reliable old hands like Frederick Wiseman, Errol Morris, Matthew Heineman, Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss… and again, Martin Scorsese. Perhaps there’s a greater sense of urgency as the planet veers from crisis to crisis. Our best cinematic artists don’t have time to make anything too frivolous.
Some venerable documentarians just missed the cut for this list, like Hoop Dreams director Steve James, whose film A Compassionate Spy (streaming on Hulu, about the long aftermath of the Manhattan Project) would make a fine companion piece both to Nolan’s Oppenheimer and Morris’ The Pigeon Tunnel. See also: Wham! (streaming on Netflix), the excellent doc about ’80s pop heroes George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley from Chris Smith, the great director behind American Movie, Fyre, and Tiger King.
As is the case most years, many of 2023’s best documentaries were about visual artists and musicians. But even the movies here not specifically about art are still about how humans try to order and understand their world — and themselves.
Where to watch: Apple TV Plus
Writer David Cornwell, known to the public by his pen name, John le Carré, died in 2020. But in the last years of his life, he consented to be
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