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I know some of you will be thrilled that Michael Moore has 3 on the list.

It will not let me see the list. Where is Crumb listed?

It's at #7.

Interesting list, but weighted toward recent material. I don't know enough about documentaries historically to suggest obvious replacements.

For starters, as much as I love Hoop Dreams, it should've been #2. Night and Fog, Alain Resnais' masterpiece, should've been tops, instead of all the way down to #24.

And it's missing:
The Triumph of the Will
Gates of Heaven (on Roger Ebert's Permanent Top 10)
Stop Making Sense
Let It Be
When We Were Kings
The Sorrow and the Pity
Hearts of Darkness
Waco: The Rules of Engagement
7Up, 14Up ... 49Up
Touching the Void
The Last Waltz
Murderball
Hail! Hail! Rock'nRoll
The Endless Summer
Mad Hot Ballroom
Everest
Looking for Richard
Pumping Iron
Ghosts of the Abyss
That's Entertainment!

Straight up, Nick! Lots of good choices among your overlooked doc's.

Oh, yes. Night and Fog is stunning.

The list is also missing Stevie.

and the Danielson doc. (That's the one that I am in for three whole seconds, in case you forgot.)

And that crooked eye Jesus one, too. Loved it, can't remember its name.

Oh, and Hellhouse.

Nice to see Born Into Brothels getting some more attention.

-s.

Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance... This title jumps out at me more than any other on this list. I've seen it many times, and for some reason have never... ever... thought of this as a documentary. To label it a documentary just seems to be too limiting of a definition. The same could be said of just labeling Fantasia a cartoon. Both films transend their basic forms. In fact, when I first saw Koyaanisqatsi, Fantasia was the only other film I could compare it to, in the sense that they both are pure visual and aural feasts, that don't necessarily rely on a narrative structure (with the exception of The Sorcerer's Apprentice).

I think the key problem with the list is its brevity. I think there has been a boom in docs in recent years, so it's understandable that it is weighted to more current films.

The older doc that I miss having on the list is A Time for Burning.

Stef, It's The Search for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus.

Well, the definition of "documentary" can include a rather large span of non-fiction films OR be very loosely defined. However, I do think the only way a Michael Moore film should get placed on such a list is with some kind of qualifying statement, which I would love to read.

Perusing the list...

A followup documentary, Hoop Reality screens at the upcoming Virginia Film Festival, with Arthur Agee on hand for the event.

I can't access the list either. Could you cut and paste it into this thread?

Nick, you're dead right. If it's missing Night & Fog, The Triumph of the Will, Gates of Heaven, The Sorrow and the Pity and The Up Series, those are serious oversights. (Though I'd swap Thin Blue Line for Gates Of Heaven if I could only have one Erroll Morris).

The September issue of Sight & Sound featured documentaries, and while they didn't lay down an actual list of the greats, there are plenty of essential titles listed. I'd jot those in here if it weren't so late, and I so much in need of some shut-eye. Maybe sometime.

R

After reading the list I didn't have any real arguments. After all, a list is only a list. However, I would be interested to know how many of the documentaries each voter had actually seen, that would surely project an final outcome. In the end, I would have traded the three Michael Moore docs and An Inconvenient Truth for four others.

The list has also encouraged me to get out there a view a few I haven't seen yet.

Is Peter Watkins' Edvard Munch listed there?or any of his other movies?

for the record, since the L.A. Times story on this isn't available, I've replaced the link in post on with one that will work.