Doc Corner: Best Documentaries of 2023

By Glenn Charlie Dunks

I usually give myself until the Oscar ceremony to do any best-of-the-year lists. Mostly because I like to be as thorough as I can be. This year, however, lent me a few extra hurdles to jump over, which meant it took me a little bit longer than normal. Buying my first home, a litany of illnesses, the loss of a close friend, and general exhaustion with the movies of 2023. But, hey, here we are at the end of March and, honestly, movies don’t just vanish once the year is out so why not finally go about publishing my best documentaries of the year list?

This year in documentary lacked the sort of movie like All the Beauty and the Bloodshed or Collective that loomed over the entire end-of-year discussion and therefore there was no clear number one title of the year. For me, at least. But that didn’t mean there weren’t many to choose from. Most critics groups lingered on the sort of American movies that the Academy does not gravitate towards. Some didn’t like that the Academy ignored them all, but if the industry is so hung up on American features not being nominated then maybe they need to fund and release more challenging works. Just a thought.

I wanted to start, however, with a few special citations before we get to the top 15 documentaries of the year.

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Doc Corner: 'Taylor Mac’s 24-Decade History of Popular Music'

By Glenn Charlie Dunks

It’s rather fitting to have watched Taylor Mac’s 24-Decade History of Popular Music at the tail end of pride month as LGBTQ+ rights are yet again being politicised and stripped while its community are demonised. Queer people of various sorts have existed for more than 24 decades, obviously. But in his massive theatrical undertaking, playwright and performance artist Taylor Mac integrates his own queer sense of self into American history.

Through song, spoken word, and flamboyant theatricality, he tells the sort of the United States of America, using music to celebrate all kinds of humanity and asking us as an audience to see ourselves and our struggles across time...

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A rollicking good Tony Awards this year with "Hadestown" dominating

by Nathaniel R

The Tony Awards are -- very generally speaking -- the best produced awards show of the majors. Though their Emmy category keeps changing consider this: In the past 12 years of the Emmys, the Tony Awards have won their category 8 times from 11 nominations, missing a nomination only once. The Oscars and the Globes and the Grammys could never; Their combined total of wins and nominations in that same 12 year time frame is 0 out of 20. Last night at the 73rd annual Tony Awards, the American Theatre Wing demonstrating again why they're always a threat as "Best" with a remarkably sincere but funny and entertaining show with a plethora of fantastic acceptance speeches and exciting musical performances. The musical Hadestown and the epic play The Ferryman were the big winners with 8 and 4 wins respectively.

After the jump some of our own 'Best' proclamations of the night, the full winners list, and awards trivia...

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u know where i'm at, u know where I be, u in the blog just to linky 🎵

If you missed part one of our massive link roundup to catch up on news and such, that's here. Going a lot shorter for part two

/Film on the 20th anniversary of Boogie Nights
This is Not Porn Sigourney Weaver with a pumpkin
/i09 Jeff Goldblum riffing on the meaning of "Ragnarok" - I was personally alarmed to see this whole story this morning because I feel like I knew all this classic mythology stuff when I was in diapers and I KNOW we learned some of it in school. Is mythology not taught anymore? Weird cause kids tend to love it (since there are superpowers, monsters, etcetera)
Jezebel a fine interview with famous primatologist Jane Goodall about her work, the new documentary about her, and climate change

Film School Rejects 35 things we learned from Edgar Wright's Baby Driver commentary
AV Club Carla Gugino and Bruce Greenwood on filming Gerald's Game, another Stephen King adaptation that people are actually liking (what is happening?)
Coming Soon Director Taiki Waititi (What We Do in the Shadows, Thor Ragnarok) is very coy about whether or not he'll direct the long gestating live action remake of anime classic Akira but if he does, he won't be casting non-Asians. So if they must make this movie, let's hope he gets the job.
Playbill Idina Menzel didn't want to write a memoir so her sister wrote a book about their lives "Voice Lessons: A Sisters Story"
/Film Corey Haim & Corey Feldman, teen idols of the late 80s, are getting the Lifetime movie treatment
W Magazine Cara Delevingne is now an author ("Mirror Mirror") and a brunette
The New Yorker "Everything that I'm afraid might happen now that I've lost my headphones"

Congrats to the MacArthur Genius Grant Winners.
The 24 recipients for 2017 have been named who will each receive the grant of $625,000 which is a lot of change for most writers and artists and performers. Celebrities of course make truckloads of money but that's much different than toiling away for your craft in most arts careers. Twenty four recipients from many different kinds of field were chosen so let's just list those in the arts: Annie Baker (playwright), Rhiannon Giddens (musician), Taylor Mac (performance artist ♥︎), Yuval Sharon (opera producer), Tyshawn Sorey (composer), and Jesmyn Ward (writer)

Links, Kids

Broadway World James Whale's Showboat finally on DVD
AV Club whoa. The Grand Budapest Hotel made entirely out of Legos
Antagony & Ecstacy reviews The Fault in Our Stars with the best review title going anywhere. The rest of the review is another reminder that Tim Brayton is one of the essential online critics.

AP "Dame" Angelina Jolie? She just received an honorary title in England
Deadline Keanu Reeves will take the role vacated by Daniel Craig in that Courtney Hunt (Frozen River) Renée Zellweger picture The Whole Truth so it's back on
In Contention is The Judge with Downey Jr and Duvall an Oscar contender?
Deadline Tom Hiddleson will star as Hank Williams in an upcoming biopic and do his own singing!
The Black Maria looks back at the brief swing music renaissance in 90s cinema. Oh I used to love Swing Kids
Employee of the Month interviews the incomparable performance artist Taylor Mac
Yahoo horrifying slapstick bathroom humor of Paddington teaser will break the hearts of anyone who loved the actual dignified humble character of Paddington in book form. Sigh... here's another flop for Nicole Kidman (who does not appear in the teaser)
Pop Watch wants blockbusters to lighten up and return to fun times. Agreed. Love the list of who is to blame.

Finally...
Though we already gagged over this on Twitter, if you haven't yet seen it because you were mainlining OITNB or (gasp) offline, here is Sarah Paulson introducing her new character... excuse me, new characters on American Horror Story season 4. Meet "Bette" and "Dot"...

So excited to be playing Bette AND Dot this season. Two heads are better than one! #AHSFREAKSHOW pic.twitter.com/jdZJSPercn

— Sarah Paulson (@MsSarahPaulson) June 12, 2014

I can't think of an actress on TV that I'd like to see two of more right now, can you?