Year in Review: 50 Biggest Documentary Hits
Wednesday, December 18, 2019 at 3:00PM Our year in review party begins. A different list each day. Here's Glenn Dunks...
The documentary box office of 2018 was always going to be hard to beat - impossible, even. Last year we had five documentaries reach totals greater than $10mil. This year, unfortunately, we had none, although one of those five, Peter Jackson's colorized war doc They Shall Not Grow Old made the bulk of its money in the new year so there's that, as did Oscar winner Free Solo.
Nevertheless, the realm of non-fiction more or less thrived in cinemas across America. Where indie flicks with big names faultered, sputtered and got chewed up by the markets divergance towards streaming, documentaries continued to post solid numbers for their boutique distributors. The clear winner for 2019 was Apollo 11, which capitalized on the 50th anniversary of man's first walk on the moon as well as being marketed as an event movie in IMAX. It missed an Oscar nomination, but as last year's snubs for Won't You Be My Neighbour and Three Identical Strangers suggest, box office doesn't always make that a done deal.
Still, we are here to talk box office so let's look at the list.
TOP 50 GROSSING DOCUMENTARIES FOR 2019
Domestic Box Office Totals Only - Figures as of March 12th, 2020
RANK | TITLE | (DISTRIBUTOR, RELEASE DATE) | DOMESTIC GROSS
01 Apollo 11 (Neon, March 1st) $9.0 [REVIEW]
02 Penguins (Disney, April 17th) $7.6...
