By Glenn Dunks
they shall not grow old
We do a good job here covering documentaries. Especially since I have a 9 to 5-Monday to Friday day job. But we cover, I want to say, somewhere between 50 and 80 films a year in Doc Corner. I only say this to preface the news of the 2019 Critics Choice Documentary Awards because my gosh there are still just so many we do not or can not (or will not) get to. There are an estimated 300+ docs released every year. That is, to put it mildly, quite a lot.
Which brings us to their nominees for 2019. The list features many that we have already covered, more that we plan to upon their theatrical release or as we get deeper into the season, and even some that we do not want to review. Leading the pack with six nominations are Apollo 11, The Biggest Little Farm (more good news this week for Parasite distributor NEON) and Peter Jackson’s They Shall Not Grow Old (which some would consider a 2018 release).
Read on the see the nominations (AND NOW UPDATED WITH WINNERS) in full...
It is worth noting well-liked films that received no nominations at all include The Great Hack, Homecoming, What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire, The Proposal, The Russian Five, Jawline, neither of Alex Gibney's films Citizen K and The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley or either of the Fyre Festival documentaries.
However, if I were predicting the Oscar nominations from now, I would not be straying too far. For whatever it’s worth, my predictions for a while now have been American Factory, Apollo 11, The Edge of Democracy, Maiden and One Child Nation. Watch me be wrong, of course (I am not a member of the Critics Choice committee). But now on to the nominees.
The D A Pennebaker Award (Lifetime Achievement): Frederick Wiseman
The Landmark Award: Michael Apted (the 7 Up series)
Hard to deny either of these, hey?
one child nation
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
American Factory (review)
★ Apollo 11 (review)
The Biggest Little Farm
The Cave
Honeyland (review)
The Kingmaker
Knock Down the House (review)
Leaving Neverland (review)
Maiden (review)
One Child Nation (review)
They Shall Not Grow Old (review)
An impressive array of nominees, even if I bristle at the inclusion of a TV docu-series again (however impressed I was by Leaving Neverland). And while I don't count myself as a fan of Jackson’s colorized WWII diary – quite frankly, I found They Shall Not Grow Old unsettling – I can understand why many would be impressed. Alas, it will not be eligible for this year’s Oscar season as it briefly played in cinemas towards the end of 2018. It’s worth noting that while this year hasn’t had a Won’t You Be My Neighbour, there are nonetheless four seven-figure hits. All eight of the eligible films are titles I would expect to be competitive for Oscar.
waad al-kateab
BEST DIRECTOR
Waad Al-Kateab and Edward Watts, For Sama (interview)
★ Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, American Factory (review)
John Chester, The Biggest Little Farm
Feras Fayyad, The Cave
★ Peter Jackson, They Shall Not Grow Old
Todd Douglas Miller, Apollo 11 (review)
Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang, One Child Nation (review)
The British-produced soc For Sama is a lone Best Director nominee. See, even documentary awards with ten nominees for the top prize can have those! The only directors here who've previously been nominated for the Oscars in documentary? The directors behind American Factory and The Cave.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Ben Bernhard and Viktor Kossakovsky, Aquarela
★ John Chester, The Biggest Little Farm
Fejmi Daut and Samir Ljuma, Honeyland (review)
Nicholas de Pencier, Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
Muhammed Khair Al Shami, Ammar Suleiman, and Mohammad Eyad, The Cave
Richard Ladkani, Sea of Shadows
It’s hardly surprising that so many of these are environmental and/or nature adjacent documentaries.
BEST EDITING
Georg Michael Fischer and Verena Schönauer, Sea of Shadows
★ Todd Douglas Miller, Apollo 11 (review)
Jabez Olssen, They Shall Not Grow Old
Amy Overbeck, The Biggest Little Farm
Lindsay Utz, American Factory (review)
Nanfu Wang, One Child Nation (review)
Since seeing it, I have suspected that Miller’s work on Apollo 11 could be the first non-fiction Oscar nominee since Hoop Dreams. If NEON aren’t sending him to as many editors functions as they are documentary functions then they’re mad.
BEST SCORE
Jeff Beal, The Biggest Little Farm
Matthew Herbert, The Cave
★ Matt Morton, Apollo 11 (review)
Plan 9, They Shall Not Grow Old
H. Scott Salinas, Sea of Shadows
Eicca Toppinen, Aquarela
Speaking of which, I am concerned about J. Ralph. He has only scored two projects since 2017 (most notably the Wu Tang Clan doc, Of Mics and Men).
biggest little farm
BEST NARRATION
Alicia Vikander (narration) and Jennifer Baichwal (writing), Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
John Chester and Molly Chester (narration) and John Chester (writing), The Biggest Little Farm
Petra Costa (narration) and Petra Costa, Carol Pires, David Barker and Moara Passoni (writing), The Edge of Democracy (review)
Chiwetel Ejiofor (narration) and Mark Deeble (writing), The Elephant Queen
Waad Al-Kateab (narration and writer), For Sama (interview)
Adam Driver (narration), Oren Rudavsky and Bob Seidman, (writing), Joseph Pulitzer: Voice of the People
Nanfu Wang (narration and writing), One Child Nation (review)
★ Bruce Springsteen (narration and writing), Western Stars
This does somewhat feel like the voice categories at other award shows where being a famous name helps. But even then, I haven’t seen enough of these as of yet to really say. I’m sure Bruce Springsteen is thrilled.
BEST FIRST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Midge Costin, Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound
A.J. Eaton, David Crosby: Remember My Name
Pamela B. Green, Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché (review)
★ Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov, Honeyland (review)
Richard Miron, For the Birds
Garret Price, Love, Antosha
If you get the chance to see Making Waves in a cinema, I really suggest you take it. So glad to see Be Natural get at least one nomination. I enjoyed it so much. And for those who are fans, Love, Antosha is the documentary about the late Anton Yelchin.
BEST ARCHIVAL DOCUMENTARY
Amazing Grace (review)
★ Apollo 11 (review)
Maiden
Mike Wallace is Here
Pavarotti
Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story
They Shall Not Grow Old
What’s My Name: Muhammad Ali
BEST BIOGRAPHICAL DOCUMENTARY
David Crosby: Remember My Name
The Kingmaker
Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice (review)
Love, Antosha
Mike Wallace is Here
Pavarotti
★ Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am
BEST MUSIC DOCUMENTARY
Amazing Grace (review)
David Crosby: Remember My Name
★ Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice (review)
Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool (review)
Pavarotti
Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese
Western Stars
BEST POLITICAL DOCUMENTARY
★ American Factory (review)
The Edge of Democracy (review)
Hail Satan? (review)
The Kingmaker
Knock Down the House (review)
One Child Nation (review)
I love that they snuck Penny Lane’s wonderful Hail Satan in there. She is so undervalued as a documentarian.
BEST SCIENCE/NATURE DOCUMENTARY
Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
★ Apollo 11 (review)
Aquarela
The Biggest Little Farm
The Elephant Queen
Honeyland (review)
Penguins
Sea of Shadows
BEST SPORTS DOCUMENTARY
Bethany Hamilton: Unstoppable
Diego Maradona (review)
★ Maiden (review)
Rodman: For Better or Worse
The Spy Behind Home Plate
What’s My Name: Muhammad Ali
MOST INNOVATIVE DOCUMENTARY
Aquarela
Cold Case Hammarskjöld (review)
Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story
Screwball
Serendipity
★ They Shall Not Grow Old
BEST SHORT DOCUMENTARY
The Chapel at the Border (Atlantic Documentaries)
Death Row Doctor (The New York Times Op-Docs)
In the Absence (Field of Vision)
Lost World
Mack Wrestles (ESPN)
★ Period. End of Sentence. (Netflix)
The Polaroid Job (The New York Times Op-Docs)
Sam and the Plant Next Door (The Guardian)
The Unconditional
The Waiting Room (The Guardian)
Hilariously, not a single one of the eight shorts we looked at last week feature. Last year’s Oscar winner, however, does appear. I haven't seen any of these, but many of them sound like documentary short nominees. I mean, has any title quite so screamed Best Documentary Short Subject than Death Row Doctor? After all, this is a category where we annual rank the Oscar nominees on how depressing they are.
maiden
MOST COMPELLING LIVING SUBJECTS OF A DOCUMENTARY
Non competitive. They all win.
Dr. Amani Ballor – The Cave
David Crosby – David Crosby: Remember My Name
Tracy Edwards – Maiden (review)
Imelda Marcos – The Kingmaker
Hatidze Muratova – Honeyland (review)
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Amy Vilela, Cori Bush, and Paula Jean Swearengin – Knock Down the House (review)
Linda Ronstadt – Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice (review)
Dr. Ruth Westheimer – Ask Dr. Ruth