Top Docs: Award-Winning Documentary Filmmakers

We invited directors Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev back to “Top Docs” to discuss the unique art that animates their Sundance award-winning documentary “Porcelain War,” an intimate portrait of three Ukrainian artists and their responses to the Russian invasion of their country. Brendan and Slava analyze one of the film’s magical moments, about halfway through the film, in which Anya (Slava’s c...

The message from some of the most powerful forces in Japanese society was clear: “Don’t talk about it.” But, over the course of a yearslong journey depicted in her powerful new documentary “Black Box Diaries,” Japanese journalist Shiori Ito does all she can to expose the facts and tell her story of how she was raped in 2015 by a prominent journalist. After the Tokyo Metropolitan Police decided not...

Today we speak with Nanfu Wang, about her new documentary, “Night is Not Eternal,” a portrait of the Cuban struggle for democracy, with a focus on Cuban human rights activist Rosa Maria Payá.   Nanfu was previously on the pod discussing her last documentary “In the Same Breath”, which was shortlisted for an Academy Award in 2022.  In that film, Nanfu found the focus of her previous work, which had...

To his “real” family, Mats Steen was a loving brother and son, rather shy and reserved; to his World of Warcraft family, Mats — known by his avatar Ibelin Redmoore — was bold, outgoing, and something of a ladies’ man. Both families were devastated by Mats’ tragic passing from Duchenne muscular dystrophy when he was only in his mid-20s. In his deeply moving, brilliantly constructed new Netflix docu...

In their first foray outside the context of American history and culture, Ken Burns (“The Brooklyn Bridge”, “The Civil War”, Jazz) and Dave McMahon (“The Central Park Five”, “Jackie Robinson”, “The War”) take on Leonardo da Vinci.  As they tell Mike, casting themselves deep into the past, Burns and McMahon explore the world that Leonardo found himself–first the Tuscan countryside, then Florence at...

Probably the last place you want to have a lover’s quarrel is during an illegal climb up one of the world’s tallest buildings — especially when your goal is to perform a death-defying acrobatic duet on the tiny platform at the top of the building’s spire. But in Jeff Zimbalist’s (“The Two Escobars,” “ReMastered”) harrowing, breathtaking documentary “Skywalkers: A Love Story,” that’s exactly where...

In his highly engaging new Netflix documentary “Martha,” Emmy award-winning filmmaker RJ Cutler (“Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry”, “Big Vape”) calls Martha Stewart the original influencer. Throughout the 80s and 90s, on her TV show and with her Kmart retail line and publishing empire, Martha defined good taste as it related to virtually every aspect of the American home. Her magazine a...

If you don’t want to get burned in American politics, “Lean into the fire.” So says James Carville, the world’s most famous presidential campaign manager, in award-winning filmmaker Matt Tyrnauer’s thoroughly engaging and refreshing new documentary, “Carville: Winning is Everything, Stupid.” Carville’s sharp-edged political commentary has, for years, provided a constant stream of content for cable...

“The Last of the Sea Women” sounds like it might be a B movie classic in the mold of “King Kong vs. Godzilla.” But while Sue Kim’s fascinating and sui generis feature directorial debut shares very little in common with that movie genre, it does spotlight a group of extraordinary women from South Korea who have been living like real-life superheroes for centuries.   Sue joins Ken on the pod to talk...

Like many parents of young children who run around the house wreaking havoc, Montrealers Edith Lemay and Sébastian Pelletier have their hands full. But in their case, what concerns them most is that three of their four children suffer from a genetic condition called retinitis pigmentosa, which is gradually robbing Mia, Colin and Laurent of their eyesight. In their deeply moving new documentary, BL...

The 2024 Toronto International Film Festival , which runs September 5 – 15, 2024, promises, once again, to be one of the world’s premier showcases for documentaries. TIFF’s renowned Documentary Programmer and DOC NYC co-founder Thom Powers ( Pure Nonfiction , WNYC’s Documentary of the Week ) joins Ken to break down the TIFF DOCS lineup and discuss what are sure to be some of the Fall awards season...

At one time, being “Slimed” on Nickelodeon was seen as the ultimate television rite of passage and a harmless bit of fun. But as “Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV” — Mary Robertson (“Framing Britney Spears”) and Emma Schwartz’ (“Elon Musk’s Crash Course”) devastating investigation of the warped culture at Nickelodeon in the 90s and 2000s — reveals, the atmosphere both on and off the set at N...

Director Bao Nguyen returns to “Top Docs” to illuminate the creative process behind his captivating, and now multi-Emmy nominated, Netflix doc “The Greatest Night in Pop” about the behind-the-scenes studio recording of the iconic 1980s famine relief song “We Are the World”. Bao takes us deep inside his approach to characterization and tension-building in the fascinating and compelling sequence in...

Fisher Stevens returns to the pod bearing 5 Emmy Nominations for his 4-part Netflix Series about the British football legend. He digs in deep with us on the opening sequence of Episode 3 of the series: "Golden Balls". And his delight is evident in meeting his old friends once again--Victoria and David, certainly, but Luís Figo, Gary Neville, and even Sir Alex Ferguson as well.   You can also liste...

We continue our Emmy coverage with a conversation with the filmmakers behind the Netflix series, “ Escaping Twin Flames ”:  director Cecilia Peck as well as executive producer and editor Inbal Lessner (both of “ Brave Miss World ,” and “ Seduced: Inside the Nexium Cult .”)  Here is how Cecilia describes the series:   “Escaping Twin Flames is a three part Netflix doc series investigating ‘Twin Flam...

  It’s been 34 years since the stunning, untimely death of Jim Henson at the age of just 53. But, in the years since, Henson’s creations (aka The Muppets) have continued their reign on “Sesame Street”, at theme parks and in the movies. Jim Henson’s coterie of lovable characters is as present as ever. Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard (“A Beautiful Mind”, “Frost/Nixon”) takes on the legacy...

9 years after the debut of his remarkable docuseries “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst”, which included a stunning confession by Durst on a hot mic, acclaimed filmmaker Andrew Jarecki (“Capturing the Friedmans”) is still at it. In April 2024, HBO released the first of his new six-episode series, “The Jinx - Part Two”, an investigation every bit as chilling and riveting as Part One......

Continuing our Emmy coverage, today we speak with the creators of the  Emmy-nominated HBO documentary series, “Telemarketers”.  Co-director Adam Bhala Lough describes the 3-part series this way: “Two scumbag telemarketers discover that there are cogs in the wheel of a multimillion dollar scam. And so they band together to try to take down the scam and then take down the industry.”   Adam joins Mik...

“Climbing the mountain” is a fitting description of the uphill struggle that all documentary filmmakers face when taking on any new project. Acclaimed filmmaker Lucy Walker (“Bring Your Own Brigade”, “The Crash Reel”) takes that metaphor to new heights with “Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa,” her ambitious, multilayered new documentary portrait of world class mountain climber Lhakpa Sh...

When the U.S. military pulled out of Afghanistan in 2021, effectively ending America’s longest war, that seemed like the end of the story for most journalists. But for director Ibrahim Nash’at, the story that he wanted to tell was just beginning. In his haunting new documentary “Hollywoodgate”, Nash’at does what virtually no other journalist or filmmaker has dared to do: tag along with the victori...

In the 1960s and 1970s, the Memphis sound was everywhere: Sam and Dave, Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, Isaac Hayes — the list goes on. Not only did the Memphis sound (a.k.a. Memphis soul) bring an amazing range of musical talent to the world, it also shined a light on the unsung city of Memphis, Tennessee and on a remarkable record company called Stax Records. In her expansive HBO docuseries “STAX: S...

  In the early 1990s, a serial killer stalked his victims not by slipping into houses under cover of darkness or by abducting victims from isolated highway rest stops, but rather by haunting crowded, lively gay bars in Manhattan–he even interacted with others in these bars, sometimes the very friends of his victims.     What makes “Last Call: When a Serial Killer Stalked Queer New York” so compell...

Sir David Attenborough’s still got it. As he proves in Netflix’s extraordinary nature series “ Our Planet II ”, the 98-year-old legendary British biologist, natural historian, narrator, and writer remains one of the documentary world’s great talents.   Joining Mike and Ken on the pod, “Our Planet II" Series Producer Huw Cordey discusses the ins-and-outs of collaborating with narrator Sir David and...

In 2015, a young California couple, Aaron Quinn and Denise Huskins, was awakened by a home invasion, drugged, and blindfolded; Denise was kidnapped. But that isn’t the only disturbing horror at the heart of the harrowing Netflix docuseries “American Nightmare”. Sensitively and imaginatively directed by Felicity Morris and Bernadette Higgins (“ The Tinder Swindler ”), this true crime drama focuses...

Yance Ford’s voice is key to his new documentary on Netflix, so here’s how he describes “Power”:  “Driven to contain threats to social order, American policing has exploded in scope and scale over hundreds of years. Now it can be described by one word: ‘Power’”.   Yance’s narrative is deeply rooted in a historical analysis of the roots of American policing–Indian removal, slave patrol, the anti-La...