Film-Forward

Documentary

Hooligan Sparrow

A riveting feat of guerilla filmmaking, revealing much about systems of power in China and the formidable tactics of its burgeoning activist culture.

Love Between the Covers

A documentary that busts a few myths about the romance genre and the people who read and write it.

Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

About as open and probing as a documentary gets, this is a revealing look at an unparalleled entertainer’s professional and personal life.

Zero Days

Filmmaker Alex Gibney’s new film reveals that a new type of weapon, cyber warfare, has already been created and deployed, with barely a hint of public awareness.

Under the Sun

Director Vitaly Mansky’s cool but empathetic documentary of life in the Hermit Kingdom takes us to the outer limits of what people will believe.

Life, Animated

In his graceful and disarming documentary, filmmaker Roger Ross Williams gets inside the head of Owen Suskind, an autistic young man who learned how to communicate by taking his social and language cues from classic Disney cartoons.

Francofonia

One man’s meditation on art, history, culture, and oppression, Francofonia manages to be grandiose and confining at once. It feels vital because one of the story lines the film pursues—and there are many—is the fate of the Louvre Museum’s art collection under the Nazis.

T-Rex

A deft and subtle look at the world of a boxer, a woman, an African American woman, and an athlete.

Eat That Question: Frank Zappa in His Own Words

This portmanteau of the 1960’s counterculture figure creates a portrait of a prickly, uncompromising man. It eschews the normal rock bio-doc format, and it’s all the better for it.