The 30 Best Historical Documentaries of All Time

Nine-hour testimonies share this list with tight archival essays, and a few of them were kept off television for years. Argue over which one actually changed how we remember the past.

1. 1
   When We Were Kings

   The Oscar-winning 1996 account of the 1974 Rumble in the Jungle between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in Zaire.
   1000pts
2. 2
   The Civil War

   Ken Burns' 1990 PBS series that turned still photographs and letters into one of the most-watched documentaries ever.
   914pts
3. 3
   13th

   Ava DuVernay's 2016 film tracing the line from the 13th Amendment to mass incarceration.
   914pts
4. 4
   Five Came Back

   The 2017 Netflix series on five Hollywood directors who filmed the Second World War for the U.S. government.
   879pts
5. 5
   Night and Fog

   Alain Resnais' 1956 short that confronts the abandoned Nazi camps a decade after liberation.
   831pts
6. 6
   Shoah

   Claude Lanzmann's nine-hour 1985 Holocaust documentary built entirely from witness testimony, without archival footage.
   779pts
7. 7
   Jazz

   Ken Burns' 2001 ten-part history of the music from New Orleans to the present.
   779pts
8. 8
   Hearts and Minds

   Peter Davis' Oscar-winning 1974 indictment of the Vietnam War released while the fighting continued.
   740pts
9. 9
   The Atomic Cafe

   The 1982 compilation of Cold War propaganda and civil-defence films, presented without narration.
   719pts
10. 10
    Let the Fire Burn

    The 2013 all-archival account of the 1985 Philadelphia police bombing of the MOVE house.
    652pts
11. 11
    Apollo 11

    The 2019 film that rebuilds the Moon landing from newly discovered 70mm footage with no narration.
    576pts
12. 12
    I Am Not Your Negro

    Raoul Peck's 2016 essay film built from James Baldwin's unfinished manuscript on Evers, Malcolm X and King.
    576pts
13. 13
    Harlan County, USA

    Barbara Kopple's Oscar-winning 1976 record of a Kentucky coal miners' strike and the violence around it.
    576pts
14. 14
    For All Mankind

    Al Reinert's 1989 assembly of NASA's Apollo footage into a single composite journey to the Moon.
    487pts
15. 15
    Waltz with Bashir

    Ari Folman's animated 2008 documentary reconstructing his lost memories of the 1982 Lebanon War.
    487pts
16. 16
    The Vietnam War

    Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's 2017 ten-part series told from American and Vietnamese perspectives.
    487pts
17. 17
    The Fog of War

    Errol Morris' Oscar-winning 2003 interview film in which Robert McNamara reckons with Vietnam and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
    487pts
18. 18
    The Last Days

    The Oscar-winning 1998 Shoah Foundation film following five Hungarian Holocaust survivors.
    487pts
19. 19
    Eyes on the Prize

    The 1987 PBS series chronicling the American civil rights movement from the 1950s through the 1980s.
    487pts
20. 20
    They Shall Not Grow Old

    Peter Jackson's 2018 restoration that colourised and voiced First World War footage from the trenches.
    384pts
21. 21
    The Battle of Chile

    Patricio Guzmán's three-part 1975-79 record of the final months before the 1973 coup, smuggled out of the country.
    384pts
22. 22
    The Act of Killing

    Joshua Oppenheimer's 2012 film in which Indonesian death-squad leaders re-enact their 1965 killings as movie scenes.
    384pts
23. 23
    Summer of Soul

    Questlove's Oscar-winning 2021 film resurrecting the forgotten footage of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival.
    384pts
24. 24
    The War

    Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's 2007 series on the Second World War told through four American towns.
    384pts
25. 25
    O.J.: Made in America

    Ezra Edelman's Oscar-winning 2016 eight-hour study of race, celebrity and Los Angeles through the O.J. Simpson story.
    262pts
26. 26
    The Times of Harvey Milk

    The Oscar-winning 1984 portrait of the first openly gay elected official in California and his assassination.
    262pts
27. 27
    The Look of Silence

    Joshua Oppenheimer's 2014 companion to The Act of Killing, seen through a survivor's brother confronting the perpetrators.
    262pts
28. 28
    The World at War

    The 1973 British 26-part series on the Second World War, narrated by Laurence Olivier with interviews from both sides.
    0pts
29. 29
    The Sorrow and the Pity

    Marcel Ophuls' 1969 chronicle of collaboration and resistance in one French town under Nazi occupation.
    0pts
30. 30
    Hotel Terminus

    Marcel Ophuls' Oscar-winning 1988 investigation into Gestapo chief Klaus Barbie and those who shielded him.
    0pts

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