Recently, I was asked to make a list of documentary films for the Kilimanjaro Film Institute (KFI) in Tanzania, where I’ll be speaking and teaching workshops to students and staff about the genre I love. Here’s a not too comprehensive film list of classic documentaries as well as some of my contemporary favourites:
Nanook of the North – Robert Flaherty
Man with a movie camera – Dziga Vertov
A Saint-Henri le cinq septembre – Hubert Aquin
Pour la suite du monde – Michel Brault & Pierre Perrault
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Chronique d’un été – Jean Rouch
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Titicut Follies – Frederick Wiseman
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Monterey Pop + Dont Look Back – D.A. Pennebaker
Primary + Crisis – Robert Drew & Richard Leacock
The Thin Blue Line + The Fog of War – Errol Morris
Roger & Me + Bowling for Columbine – Michael Moore
Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media – Peter Wintonick
Capturing the Friedmans – Andrew Jarecki
Grizzly Man – Werner Herzog
Hoop Dreams – Steve James
When We Were Kings – Leon Gast
Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills – Joe Berlinger & Bruce Sinofsky
Super Size me + The Greatest Movie ever sold – Morgan Spurlock
The War Room – Chris Hegedus
Adam Bemma is a journalist, humanitarian, and media consultant based in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
Adam Bemma 
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