Movies: Historical documentary

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At the height of the space race, three U.S. astronauts are tapped as the first Apollo crew. With dazzling archival footage and exceptional access, this riveting documentary explores the tragic events that followed, shaking NASA to the core....

The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) was the starting point for the slow but sure collapse of communist authoritarian rule in Eastern Europe. The Helsinki Effect offers new perspectives on the events of the Cold War. The film t...

A century after Shackleton's Endurance sank beneath the ice, explorers uncover the legendary shipwreck and an amazing tale of survival....

A keen chronicle of the unlikely rise to power of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) and a dissection of the Third Reich (1933-1945), but also an analysis of mass psychology and how the desperate crowd can be deceived and shepherded to the slaughterhouse....

Using original footage and interviews, this documentary tells the nail-biting story of Apollo 13 and the struggle to bring its astronauts safely home....

Using archival footage, cabinet conversation recordings, and an interview of the 85-year-old Robert McNamara, The Fog of War depicts his life, from working as a WWII whiz-kid military officer, to being the Ford Motor Company's president, to managing ...

Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories – survivors, bystander...

In 1968, art students Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey “Po” Powell made a trippy photo collage for their musician friends Syd, David and Roger. The resulting album and album cover, A Saucerful of Secrets, helped launch two careers: that of Pink Floyd, one...

What happened after Einstein fled Nazi Germany? Using archival footage and his own words, this docudrama dives into the mind of a tortured genius....

This documentary by Theo Kamecke from 1970 gives an in-depth and profound look at the Apollo 11 mission to the moon. NASA footage is interspersed with reactions to the mission around the world as the film captures the intensity as well of the philoso...

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Working from the text of James Baldwin’s unfinished final novel, director Raoul Peck creates a meditation on what it means to be Black in the United States....

For centuries, the Great Pyramids have fascinated Mankind. Patrice Pooyard's The Revelation Of The Pyramids reveals what lies behind the greatest of archaeological mysteries: a message of paramount importance for humanity. From China to Peru, from Eg...

This documentary delves into the mysteries surrounding the Neanderthals and what their fossil record tells us about their lives and disappearance....

How did humanity's earliest ancestors evolve into one of the most successful species on Earth? An extraordinary journey tracing the footsteps of early hominids. Using the latest paleoanthropological findings mixed with the latest CGI from Square Enix...

Egyptian archeologists dig into history, discovering tombs and artifacts over 4,000 years old as they search for a buried pyramid in this documentary....

Thundering across the sky on elegant white wings, the Concorde was an instant legend. But behind the glamour of jet setting at Mach 2 were stunning scientific innovations and political intrigue. Fifteen years after Concorde's final flight, this docum...

The director’s mother, Mirka Mora, avoided Auschwitz by one day. On his father’s side many perished in the Holocaust. These facts triggered three visits to Auschwitz by Mora from 2010 to 2014 in an effort to understand and remember....

Using masterfully restored footage from recently declassified images, The Bomb tells a powerful story of the most destructive invention in human history. From the earliest testing stages to its use as the ultimate chess piece in global politics, the ...