Best war, documentary, & biography shows streaming, ranked.
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Prime VideoMan on Wire
2008 · Movie · 1h 34mDocumentary · Biography · Crime
1 OscarA look at tightrope walker Philippe Petit's daring, but illegal, high-wire routine performed between New York City's World Trade Center's twin towers in 1974, what some consider, "the artistic crime of the century".
Prime Video - #695#695
Prime VideoDeliver Us from Evil
2006 · Movie · 1h 41mDocumentary · Crime
Documentary about Father Oliver O'Grady, a Catholic priest who was relocated to various parishes around the United States during the 1970s in an attempt by the Catholic Church to cover up his rape of dozens of children.
Prime Video - #1793#1793Paramount+
Attica
2021 · Movie · 1h 56mDocumentary · History
This unnervingly vivid dive into the 1971 uprising from Emmy® winning director Stanley Nelson sheds new light on the enduring violence and racism of the prison system and highlights the urgent, ongoing need for reform 50 years later.
Paramount+ - #1893#1893
Prime VideoGleason
2016 · Movie · 1h 50mDocumentary · Biography
At the age of 34, former New Orleans Saints defensive back Steve Gleason was diagnosed with ALS and given a life expectancy of two to five years. Weeks later, Gleason found out his wife, Michel, was expecting their first child. A video journal that began as a gift for his unborn son expands to chronicle Steve’s determination to get his relationships in order, build a foundation to provide other ALS patients with purpose, and adapt to his declining physical condition—utilizing medical technologies that offer the means to live as fully as possible.
Prime Video - #1993#1993
Prime VideoThe Endless Summer
1966 · Movie · 1h 35mDocumentary · Sport
The crown jewel to ten years of Bruce Brown surfing documentaries. Brown follows two young surfers around the world in search of the perfect wave, and ends up finding quite a few in addition to some colorful local characters.
Prime Video - #2592#2592
Prime VideoGett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem
2014 · Movie · Hebrew · 1h 55mBiography · Drama
After a lukewarm marriage of over twenty years, a woman appeals to her husband's compassion to obtain the desirable divorce document in front of a court, which proves to be more challenging than she would expect.
Prime Video - #2692#2692
Prime Video20 Feet from Stardom
2013 · Movie · 1h 31mDocumentary · Biography · History
1 OscarBackup singers live in a world that lies just beyond the spotlight. Their voices bring harmony to the biggest bands in popular music, but we've had no idea who these singers are or what lives they lead, until now.
Prime Video - #2792#2792Prime Video
Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession
2004 · Movie · 2h 2mDocumentary · Biography · History
The story of Z Channel, one of the first U.S. pay cable stations and its programming chief, Jerry Harvey. Debuting in 1974 in LA, their eclectic slate of movies became a prime example of the untapped power of cable television.
Prime Video - #3092#3092
Prime VideoLittle Dieter Needs to Fly
1997 · Movie · 1h 20mDocumentary · Biography · Drama
German-American Dieter Dengler discusses his service as a U.S. naval pilot in the Vietnam War. Dengler also revisits the sites of his capture and eventual escape from the hands of the Viet Cong, recreating many events for the camera.
Prime Video - #3592#3592
Prime VideoLost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley's Island of Dr. Moreau
2014 · Movie · 1h 37mDocumentary · Action
A behind the scenes chronicle of how clash of vision, bad creative decisions, lack of interest and really bad weather plagued the disastrous production of the infamous The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996).
Prime Video - #3991#3991Prime Video
The Russian Five
2018 · Movie · 1h 42mDocumentary · Sport
In the late 1980s, the Detroit Red Wings worked to finally break their decades long Stanley Cup drought by extracting players from the Soviet Union, and in the process, changed the way North American hockey is played.
Prime Video - #4891#4891
Prime VideoThe Babushkas of Chernobyl
2015 · Movie · 1h 10mDocumentary
An affectionate portrait of a group of women who, after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and evacuation, returned to the exclusion zone surrounding the nuclear power plant and have resided there - semi-officially, for years.
Prime Video - #6190#6190
Prime VideoStreet Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street
2021 · Movie · 1h 47mDocumentary · Family · History
Take a stroll down Sesame Street and witness the birth of the most impactful children's series in TV history. From the iconic furry characters to the songs you know by heart, learn how a gang of visionary creators changed our world.
Prime Video - #6390#6390Prime Video
Hot Potato: The Story of The Wiggles
2023 · Movie · 1h 44mDocumentary
The incredible true story of early childhood teachers and friends, The Wiggles, who rock 'n' rolled their way into the hearts of millions around the globe in one of the greatest entertainment stories of all time.
Prime Video - #6790#6790Prime Video
To Hell and Back: The Kane Hodder Story
2017 · Movie · 1h 48mDocumentary · Biography
To Hell and Back: The Kane Hodder Story is the harrowing story of a stuntman overcoming a dehumanizing childhood filled with torment and bullying in Sparks, Nevada. After surviving a near-death burn accident, he worked his way up through Hollywood, leading to his ultimate rise as Jason Voorhees in the Friday the 13th series and making countless moviegoers forever terrified of hockey masks and summer camp. Featuring interviews with cinema legends, including Bruce Campbell (Ash vs. Evil Dead), Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger), and Cassandra Peterson (Elvira: Mistress of the Dark), To Hell and Back peels off the mask of Kane Hodder, cinema's most prolific killer, in a gut-wrenching, but inspiring, documentary. After decades of watching Kane Hodder on screen, get ready to meet the man behind the mask in To Hell and Back - an uniquely human story about one of cinema's most vicious monsters.
Prime Video - #7390#7390Prime Video
What Lies Upstream
2017 · Movie · 1h 25mDocumentary · Mystery
In this scandalous political thriller, an investigation into a chemical spill spirals into an indictment of the entire system meant to protect drinking water, revealing cover-ups at the highest levels of government.
Prime Video - #7790#7790HuluPeacockPrime Video
Eddie Izzard: Dress to Kill
1999 · Movie · 1h 55mDocumentary · Comedy
2 EmmysExecutive transvestite Eddie Izzard takes his show to San Francisco to give a brief history of pagan and Christian religions, the building of Stonehenge, the birth of the Church of England ...
HuluPeacockPrime Video - #8089#8089
Prime VideoCalifornia Typewriter
2017 · Movie · 1h 43mDocumentary
California Typewriter is a story about people whose lives are connected by typewriters. The film is a meditation on creativity and technology featuring Tom Hanks, John Mayer, Sam Shepard, David McCullough and others.
Prime Video - #8589#8589
Prime VideoDirtbag: The Legend of Fred Beckey
2017 · Movie · 1h 36mDocumentary · Action · Biography
Fred Beckey is the legendary American "Dirtbag" mountaineer whose name is spoken in hushed tones around campfires. This rebel climber's pioneering ascents and lifestyle form an iconic legacy that continues to inspire generations.
Prime Video - #9289#9289Prime Video
Tickled
2016 · Movie · 1h 32mDocumentary · Crime · Mystery
Journalist David Farrier stumbles upon a mysterious tickling competition online. As he delves deeper he comes up against fierce resistance, but that doesn't stop him getting to the bottom of a story stranger than fiction.
Prime Video - #9789#9789Prime Video
All In: The Fight for Democracy
2020 · Movie · 1h 42mDocumentary
The documentary takes a look at the history, and current activism against voter suppression; barriers to voting that most people don't even know is a threat to their basic rights as citizens of the United States.
Prime Video - #9888#9888Prime Video
The Universe
2007–2015 · Series · 9 seasonsDocumentary · History
This educational show explores many scientific questions and topics about the universe (Big Bang, the Sun, the planets, black holes, other galaxies, astrobiology etc.) through latest CGI, data and interviews with scientists.
Prime Video - #10388#10388Prime Video
The Fabulous Allan Carr
2017 · Movie · 1h 30mDocumentary · Biography
Allan Carr built his bombastic reputation producing the hit movie GREASE and Broadway sensation LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, but it all came crashing down after he conceived the notorious 1989 Academy Awards.
Prime Video - #10488#10488Prime Video
Lucy and Desi
2022 · Movie · 1h 43mDocumentary · Biography · Comedy
2 EmmysThis film explores the rise of comedy icon Lucille Ball, her relationship with Desi Arnaz, and how their groundbreaking sitcom "I Love Lucy" forever changed Hollywood, cementing her legacy long after her death in 1989.
Prime Video - #10588#10588Prime Video
Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles
2019 · Movie · 1h 37mDocumentary
The origin story behind one of Broadway's most beloved musicals, Fiddler on The Roof, and its creative roots in early 1960s New York, when "tradition" was on the wane as gender roles, sexuality, race relations and religion were ev...
Prime Video - #10888#10888
Prime VideoThe Apology
2016 · Movie · 1h 44mDocumentary
The Apology explores the lives of former "comfort women", the more than 200,000 girls forced into sexual slavery during World War II. Today, they fight for reconciliation and justice as they struggle to make peace with the past.
Prime Video - #11488#11488
Prime VideoOn Her Shoulders
2018 · Movie · 1h 35mDocumentary · Biography
Nadia Murad, a 23-year-old Yazidi, survived genocide and sexual slavery committed by ISIS. Repeating her story to the world, this ordinary girl finds herself thrust onto the international stage as the voice of her people.
Prime Video - #11888#11888
Prime VideoSilicon Cowboys
2016 · Movie · 1h 17mDocumentary · History
Three friends dream up the Compaq portable computer at a Texas diner in 1981, and soon find themselves battling mighty IBM for PC supremacy. Their improbable journey altered the future of computing and shaped the world we now know.
Prime Video - #12487#12487
Prime VideoGeorge Carlin: It's Bad for Ya!
2008 · Movie · 1h 10mDocumentary · Comedy
It's Bad For Ya, Carlin's Emmy-nominated 14th and final HBO special from March of 2008 features Carlin's noted irreverent and unapologetic observations on topics ranging from death, religion, bureaucracy, patriotism, overprotected...
Prime Video - #12787#12787Prime Video
Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted
2025 · Movie · 1h 35mDocumentary · Comedy
Cult musician Swamp Dogg and housemates Moogstar and Guitar Shorty have turned their suburban LA home into an artistic haven. They journey through the turbulent music business, forming a special friendship transcending eras.
Prime Video - #12887#12887Prime Video
Fragments of Paradise
2022 · Movie · 1h 38mDocumentary
Jonas Mekas chronicled life via diary films over 70+ years, from his 1949 NYC arrival until 2019. The Lithuanian exile shaped avant-garde cinema while building indie film institutions. "Fragments of Paradise" delves into his archives
Prime Video - #13187#13187
Prime VideoJoe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten
2007 · Movie · 2h 4mDocumentary · Biography
As the front man of the Clash from 1977, Joe Strummer changed people's lives forever. Four years after his death, his influence reaches out around the world, more strongly now than ever before.
Prime Video - #13387#13387Prime Video
This Is Not a Movie: Robert Fisk and the Politics of Truth
2019 · Movie · 1h 46mDocumentary · Action · Biography
The groundbreaking and often game-changing reporting of legendary foreign correspondent and author Robert Fisk is profiled in the latest from acclaimed documentarian Yung Chang (Up the Yangtze).
Prime Video - #13787#13787
HuluPrime VideoThe Men Who Built America
2012– · Series · 1 seasonDocumentary · Biography · History
2 EmmysRockefeller, Vanderbilt, Carnegie, Astor, Ford and Morgan. Their names are part of history and synonymous with the American dream. These men transformed every industry they touched: oil, rail, steel, shipping, automobiles, and fin...
HuluPrime Video - #13887#13887Prime Video
American: An Odyssey to 1947
2022 · Movie · 1h 42mDocumentary
In the early 1930s, Orson Welles ascends to unprecedented stardom while President Franklin Delano Roosevelt navigates a nation in crisis. As WWII begins, an American boy visits abroad, and an American soldier enlists in the army.
Prime Video - #14087#14087Prime Video
It's Quieter in the Twilight
2022 · Movie · 1h 23mDocumentary
In an unremarkable office space, a select group of aging engineers find themselves at the leading edge of discovery. Fighting outdated technology and time, Voyager's flight-team pursues humankind's greatest exploration.
Prime Video - #14587#14587Prime Video
Relative
2022 · Movie · 1h 12mDocumentary
A filmmaker unearths a pervasive history of multigenerational trauma in her Italian-American family. As decades of secrets, home movies, and long-avoided conversations surface, a family once bound by tradition forges a new path forward.
Prime Video - #14887#14887Prime Video
Slay the Dragon
2019 · Movie · 1h 41mDocumentary
It influences elections and sways outcomes-gerrymandering has become a hot-button political topic and symbol for everything broken about the American electoral process. But there are those on the front lines fighting to change the...
Prime Video - #14987#14987
Prime VideoAt the Fork
2016 · Movie · 1h 29mDocumentary
Filmmaker and omnivore John Papola, together with his vegetarian wife Lisa, offer up a timely and refreshingly unbiased look at how farm animals are raised for our consumption. With unprecedented access to large-scale conventional farms, Papola asks the tough questions behind every hamburger, glass of milk and baby-back rib. What he discovers are not heartless industrialists, but America's farmers - real people who, along with him, are grappling with the moral dimensions of farming animals for food.
Prime Video - #15187#15187Prime Video
Citizen K
2019 · Movie · Russian · 2h 6mDocumentary
The strange case of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, once believed to be the wealthiest man in Russia, who rocketed to prosperity and prominence in the 1990s, served a decade in prison, and became an unlikely martyr for the anti-Putin movement.
Prime Video - #15487#15487Prime Video
Exposing Muybridge
2021 · Movie · 1h 28mDocumentary · Biography · History
The story of trailblazing 19th-century photographer Eadweard Muybridge, who changed the world with his camera. Artful, resilient, selfish, naive, eccentric, deceitful--Muybridge is a complicated, imperfect man and his story drips with ambition and success, loss and betrayal, near death experiences and even murder. "The machine cannot lie," Stanford declared of Muybridge's pioneering motion images. But what about the photographer?
Prime Video - #15887#15887Prime Video
Gabby Giffords Won't Back Down
2022 · Movie · 1h 38mDocumentary · Biography · Drama
Looking at the former congresswoman's courage and perseverance in the aftermath of the 2011 assassination attempt that left her partially paralyzed and with a language impairment, aphasia.
Prime Video - #16087#16087
Prime VideoGeorge Carlin: You Are All Diseased
1999 · Movie · 1h 5mDocumentary · Comedy
Legendary comic Carlin comes back to the Beacon theater to angrily rant about airport security, germs, cigars, angels, children and parents, men, names, religion, god, advertising, Bill Jeff and minorities.
Prime Video - #16486#16486Prime Video
United We Fan
2018 · Movie · 1h 37mDocumentary
Fans, stars, creators, and more come together to explore the dynamic history and evolution of save-our-show television fan campaigns from the letter-writing and product mail-in campaigns of yesterday to the social media and crowdf...
Prime Video - #16586#16586
Prime VideoHondros
2018 · Movie · 1h 30mDocumentary · Biography · War
HONDROS follows the life and career of famous war photographer Chris Hondros by exploring the poignant and often surprising stories behind this award-winning photojournalist's best-known photos. Driven by a commitment to bear witn...
Prime Video - #17186#17186
Paramount+Prophet's Prey
2015 · Movie · 1h 41mDocumentary · Biography · History
Filmmaker Amy Berg sheds light on the sexual, financial and spiritual abuses heaped upon members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by their former leader, Warren Jeffs.
Paramount+ - #17686#17686Prime Video
A.rtificial I.mmortality
2021 · Movie · 1h 14mDocumentary
If you could create an immortal version of yourself, would you? Once the stuff of science fiction, A.I. experts now see it as possible. This feature documentary explores the latest thinking and technological advancements in AI.
Prime Video - #17786#17786Prime Video
James May: Our Man in…
2020–2024 · Series · 3 seasonsDocumentary · Action · Comedy
James May embarks on a remarkable journey across Japan, from its icy north to its balmy south. He'll see the sights, meet the locals, and eat the noodles in a bid to truly understand the Land of the Rising Sun.
Prime Video - #18985#18985
Prime VideoMedici: Masters of Florence
2016–2019 · Series · Italian · 3 seasonsBiography · Drama · History
A political family drama set in Florence in the early fifteenth century. Cosimo de Medici finds himself at the helm of his banking dynasty when his father, Giovanni, dies suddenly.
Prime Video - #19385#19385Prime Video
Kiss the Ground
2020 · Movie · 1h 24mDocumentary
A revolutionary group of activists, scientists, farmers, and politicians band together in a global movement of "Regenerative Agriculture" that could balance our climate, replenish our vast water supplies, and feed the world.
Prime Video - #19485#19485
Prime VideoIt's Not Yet Dark
2016 · Movie · 1h 21mDocumentary
It's Not Yet Dark tells the ground breaking story of Simon Fitzmaurice, a talented young Irish film maker with ALS (MND), as he embarks on directing his first feature film through the use of his eyes and eye gaze technology.
Prime Video - #19985#19985Prime Video
Satan Wants You
2023 · Movie · 1h 28mDocumentary · Crime · Horror
The story of how the Satanic Panic of the 1980s was ignited by "Michelle Remembers", a memoir by psychiatrist and his patient. The book relied on recovered-memory therapy to uncover Michelle's abduction by baby-stealing Satanists.
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