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2023 : Documentary : October Movies - Sort: Most Popular

Portrait of Amy Renner Amy Renner

Last modified: Nov. 20, 2023

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The psychedelic carpets lining our hotel hallways, casinos, and convention centers can be traced to one town: Dalton, Georgia, the “Carpet Capital of the World.” In this bastion of American manufacturing we find an interwoven set of locals who are the unsung creators behind the majority of the country’s carpets. Among them is Roderick James, a Scottish expat living an “American Country Lifestyle” pursuing success in a rapidly changing world.

Documentary

  • 5 / 5
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Facing the Laughter: Minnie Pearl is a full-length documentary about the life and work of Sarah Cannon, aka Minnie Pearl. Sarah was a serious, educated woman who had once dreamed of becoming a Shakespearean actress, but she found fame playing a simple country girl who often made herself the butt of her jokes. Instantly identifiable – even in silhouette – by her straw hat with a price tag dangling from its brim, Minnie Pearl became an icon of country music radio, stage and TV.

NR Documentary Event 1 hr, 30 mins

83% 17%
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Turn Every Page explores the remarkable fifty-year relationship between two literary legends, writer Robert Caro and his longtime editor Robert Gottlieb. Now 86, Caro is working to complete the final volume of his masterwork, The Years of Lyndon Johnson; Gottlieb, 91, waits to edit it. The task of finishing their life’s work looms before them. With humor and insight, this unique double portrait reveals the work habits, peculiarities and professional joys of these two ferocious intellects at the culmination of a journey that has consumed both their lives and impacted generations of politicians, activists, writers, and readers.

PG Documentary

78% 22%

Tells the story of groundskeeper Lee Johnson and his fight for justice against agrichemical giant Monsanto, the manufacturer of the weed killer, Roundup.

Documentary

75% 25%
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Never Forget Tibet explores, with His Holiness 14th Dalai Lama, the details of his incredible escape into exile for the first time on film in his own words with the Indian political officer who led him to safety. Featuring the Tibetan community in exile and those with historic ties to Tibet, the film explores the Dalai Lama’s compassion for a world seemingly in crisis today and seeks to find what can be learnt from his inspirational life story, Tibetan culture and its ancient spirituality.

NR Documentary

75% 25%

Recruited in 1944 as an 18-year-old Harvard undergraduate to be the youngest physicist on the Manhattan Project, Hall didn’t share his colleagues’ elation after the successful detonation of the world’s first atomic bomb. Increasingly concerned during 1944—with Germany clearly losing the war—that a U.S. post-war monopoly on such a powerful weapon could lead to nuclear catastrophe, he decided beginning that October to start passing key information about the bomb’s construction to the Soviet Union. After the war, at the University of Chicago, he met and married Joan, a fellow student with whom he shared a passion for classical music and socialist causes — and the explosive secret of his espionage. Living under a cloud of suspicion and years of FBI surveillance and intimidation, the pair raised a family while Ted refocused his scientific brilliance on groundbreaking biophysics research.

Documentary 1 hr, 42 mins

  • 5 / 5
60% 40%
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An intimate and revealing portrait of a largely misunderstood American icon, this emotional and engaging documentary about Yogi Berra takes us beyond the caricatures and "Yogisms," and into the heart of a sports legend whose unparalleled accomplishments on the baseball diamond were often overshadowed by his off-the-field persona.

Sports Documentary 1 hr, 38 mins

  • 3.6 / 5
100% 0%

Living with Chucky takes an in depth look at the groundbreaking Child’s Play franchise from the perspective of a filmmaker who grew up within it. Featuring interviews with cast and crew such as Brad Dourif, Jennifer Tilly, Alex Vincent, creator Don Mancini, and much more, this personal film recounts the dedication, creativity and sacrifice that went into making the franchise and its long-lasting impact on the horror community.

Documentary

  • 3.7 / 5
83% 17%

Rabble rouser or activist? Opportunist or trailblazer? During his six-decade journey from pastoral prodigy to racial justice firebrand to elder media statesman, the Reverend Al Sharpton has been a polarizing figure on the national stage

NR Documentary

  • 5 / 5
29% 71%

The League celebrates the dynamic journey of Negro League baseball's triumphs and challenges through the first half of the twentieth century. The story is told through previously unearthed archival footage and never-before-seen interviews with legendary players like Satchel Paige and Buck O’Neil – whose early careers paved the way for the Jackie Robinson era – as well as celebrated Hall of Famers Willie Mays and Hank Aaron who started out in the Negro Leagues. From entrepreneurial titans Cumberland Posey and Gus Greenlee, whose intense rivalry fueled the rise of two of the best baseball teams ever to play the game, to Effa Manley, the activist owner of the Newark Eagles and the only woman ever admitted to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, The League explores Black baseball as an economic and social pillar of Black communities and a stage for some of the greatest athletes to ever play the game, while also examining the unintended consequences of integration.

PG Documentary 1 hr, 43 mins

  • 4.7 / 5
77% 23%

In 2018, a shocking event made headlines around the world: a young American missionary, John Chau, was killed by arrows while attempting to contact one of the world’s most isolated Indigenous peoples on remote North Sentinel Island. Through exclusive interviews and with unprecedented access to Chau’s secret plans, personal diaries, and video archives, THE MISSION examines the mythology of exploration that inspired him, the evangelical community that supported his quest, and reveals his own father’s heartbreak as Chau’s youthful thirst for adventure became a fatal obsession.

Documentary

  • 5 / 5
92% 8%

Enter the spectacle and drama of a megafire, alongside a firefighting team struggling to save anything they can while protecting each other. The Fireline documentary takes audiences into the firescape, to feel for the first time what those fighting these blazes face, especially as climate change makes megafires larger and more frequent. It's an intimate portrait of a system stretched to its breaking point, revealing the friendship, heartbreak, and exhilaration experienced by those who go to war against this elemental force.

Documentary

67% 33%

This Halloween, take a deep dive into one of America’s most extreme destinations of horror.

Horror Documentary

38% 62%

World-renowned therapist Phil Stutz sits down for an unusual, heartfelt session with friend and patient Jonah Hill, bringing to life Stutz’s visualization exercises, called The Tools, and sharing how to apply them to pursue “active love.”

Documentary

  • 3.5 / 5
78% 22%

After Death is a gripping feature film that explores what happens after we die, based on real near-death experiences, conveyed by scientists, authors, and survivors. From the New York Times bestselling authors who brought you titles like 90 Minutes in Heaven, Imagine Heaven, and To Heaven and Back, emerges a cinematic peek beyond the veil that examines the spiritual and scientific dimensions of mortality, inviting us to wonder: Is there life after death?

PG-13 Documentary

  • 4.7 / 5
77% 23%

Americonned is a film about income inequality in the US and the tragic destabilizing effects to Americans. Radical inequality has led to radicalization at every level of society, and this powerful documentary depicts what happens when America hits its tipping point by looking back through our history at similar critical moments of instability. The labor movement of the past was born in times just like these. We must restore the path to the once great middle class that now suffers in silence. Despite increases in productivity in recent decades, compensation for the American worker has been stagnant. And now, 47% of American jobs are at high risk of being lost to automation and A.I. by the mid-2030s.

Documentary

  • 5 / 5
75% 25%

Feature-length documentary that captures the incredible true story of the Cabbage Patch Kids, leaving nothing untouched, including the fundamental dispute over who originated the idea. From the marketing genius of the “hospital” in an idyllic North Georgian town where children “adopted” the dolls and solemnly pledged to love and care for them, to the subsequent business deal that gave rise to utter retail pandemonium, the film takes viewers on the wild ride through the Cabbage Patch Kids’ highs, lows and undeniable legacy.

Documentary

  • 1 / 5
63% 38%

Bye Bye Barry is the long-awaited documentary film that reveals in intimate detail the unprecedented journey of Barry Sanders. One of the giants of the sport, Sanders displayed a style and flair that has never been duplicated. Bye Bye Barry, the definitive first-hand account of Barry Sanders’ remarkable life story.

Documentary

  • 5 / 5
82% 18%

Hiroshima. Nagasaki. Mercury, Nevada? The latter was the site for the testing of 928 large-scale nuclear weapons from 1951 to 1992. Martin Sheen narrates this harrowing exposé of the United States' disregard for everyone living… downwind.

Documentary

  • 5 / 5
50% 50%

NUCLEAR NOW takes viewers on a mind-opening journey with legendary director Oliver Stone as he reveals the true history of nuclear energy and its potential to solve climate change. The looming climate crisis remains unresolved, and the volume of carbon-free electricity needed over the next 30 years is almost unimaginable. This film aims to remove the fears associated with nuclear energy and highlight the sustainability and affordability it can bring in the pursuit of restoring the world’s ecosystems and economies.

Documentary

  • 1 / 5
78% 22%

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