As midsummer turns its searing spotlight upon us and dreams of milder days beckon from afar, the year’s glut of documentaries similarly oscillates between incendiary spectacles and chilly domestic fare. The latest additions to ’s ongoing list of 2024’a best documentaries grows more ambitious and baroque, including a Martin Scorsese-produced tribute to the kings of postwar British cinema, a generative portrait of an electronic music composer, and an unusual caper about shopping mall architecture. Each of these new releases highlights the widening scope of documentary and proves non-fiction filmmaking can be as formally innovative and topically complex as any narrative film.
Here, our list of the best documentary films of 2024 (so far). (February 9) This documentary follows the celebrated Italian film composer Ennio Morricone, whose soundtracks for 1960s and ’70s spaghetti westerns, political dramas, gialli, and, later on, American melodramas and action films often rivaled or outshone the movies themselves. contains detailed interviews with the composer (Morricone died in 2020) on some of the 400 soundtracks he produced throughout his lifetime.
The film also includes a who’s who of filmmakers and musicians, including Quentin Tarantino, Bruce Springsteen, Quincy Jones, and Clint Eastwood, who share their thoughts on or memories of Morricone. How to watch: Stream on , , or . (March 8) This portrait of enfant terrible and culture vulture John Galliano—former creative d.
