Doc Corner: Documentary Hits of 2017
Tuesday, December 26, 2017 at 3:00PM Each day a new year-in-review / recap list of sorts. Here's Glenn Dunks
Nathaniel has already looked at the foreign language hits of the year and a the top-grossers for films by or about women, people of colour, LGBTQ and more. Now it's my turn to chime in with a look at what non-fiction movies were doing at the box office. It ain't exactly pretty - but, then, the figures below don't always paint an accurate picture for the world of documentary.
Much like the rest of the independent and arthouse scenes, festivals and VOD/streaming are becoming the primary way for audiences to see documentaries. Some of the most buzzed and most discussed of the year, for instance, are Strong Island, Icarus, Voyeur and Chasing Coral, which never received a theatrical release beyond minimal Oscar-qualifying runs. Meanwhile, other significant 2017 titles like LA 92, Oklahoma City, Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds aired on TV.
TOP 40 DOCUMENTARIES FOR 2017
Listed by US Box Office Gross only. Linked titles leads to reviews.
Oscar finalists are in bold
1. BORN IN CHINA $13.8 (April 21st)
As is often the case these days, a Disneynature title tops the chart. However, the figures for these Earth Day releases are diminishing. This one about pandas is the lowest-grossing of the seven Disneynature docs to be theatrically released since Earth in 2009 (so, not including The Crimson Wing: Mysteries of the Flamingo which went curiously unreleased in America). Still, this is a great figure for a nature documentary and as long as they keep churning them out hopefully people keep going in at least these modest numbers.
2. I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO $7.1 (February 3rd)
One of the lone bright spots among the first half of the year for arthouses was this Oscar-nominated James Baldwin doc. We may grimace when distributors keep films from the general public, but Magnolia were smart to see they not only had a very likely Oscar contender on their hands (it should have won, but that's not what we're here to discuss), but that there's no way for these films to thrive among the end-of-year prestige glut...
3. AN INCONVENIENT SEQUEL $3.4 (July 28th)
As you will soon see, a seven-figure gross for any documentary is essentially good news, but the downturn in grosses from the 2006 original and this sequel was alarming and made for one of the steepest original-to-sequel box office dives in history. I wish I could say it deserved it, but for my money the year's superior climate change doc was Chasing Coral on Netflix. The Academy liked both sufficiently enough to include them on their 15-wide longlist.
4. KEDI $2.8 (February 10th)
Why were people surprised that the doc about Turkish cats wound up being such a sleeper hit? Remarkable to think that this film opened back in February on only a single screen!
5. JANE $1.7 (October 20th)
This doc is an antidote to darkness right now, but as witnessed by its weekly grosses, it's being hurt by the onslaught of bigger, glitzier titles. Should it win the Oscar like I suspect it might, a re-release would be smart. Its lush and colourful archival footage would be such a delight for people to witness on a big screen.
6. STEP $1.1 (August 4th)
Undoubtedly one of the disappointments of the year. For whatever reasons, the audiences just didn't materialise like people expected out of its acclaimed Sundance bow.
7. FACES PLACES $953k (October 6th) *OSCAR NOMINATED*
8. BOMBSHELL: THE HEDY LAMARR STORY $820k (Nov 24th)
That figure may seem low, but for a cinema like the IFC Center in NYC where most of its money has been made, they'd be more than happy with the figures, I suspect, for this charming old Hollywood story.
8. WALK WITH ME $665k (August 11th)
9. DOLORES $549k (Sept 1st)
10. OUR PRESIDENT $507k (June 2nd)
11. HUMAN FLOW $527k (October 13th)
13. LETTERS FROM BAGHDAD $359k (June 2nd)
14. LONG STRANGE TRIP - THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE GRATEFUL DEAD $351k (May 25th)
For a four-hour movie, this is pretty damn good!
15. OBIT $315k (January 5th)
16. CITIZEN JANE $313k (April 21st)
The other documentary Jane of 2017 did well enough to prove there's still a niche market for architecture films. Strange, but true! Jane Jacobs, the urban studies activist, had quite a year showing up in an episode of The Marvelous Mrs Maisel (where she's played by Alison Smith) and as a character in the new Off Broadway musical Bulldozer (played by Molly Pope) in addition to this successful documentary.
17. JEREMIAH TOWER $228k (April 21st)
18. RUMBLE: THE INDIANS WHO ROCKED THE WORLD $226k (May 18th)
19. CALIFORNIA TYPEWRITER $218k (August 18th)
20. RISK $200k (May 5th)
21. WHOSE STREETS $182k (August 11th)
22. TAKE EVERY WAVE: THE LIFE OF LAIRD HAMILTON $176k (Sept 29th)
Like Bollywood movie over in the foreign language side of the box office, surfing docs have a reliability about them.
23. DAVID LYNCH THE ART LIFE $171k (March 31st)
Now available on Criterion DVD.
24. EX LIBRIS - THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY $150k (Sept 13th)
25. THE LAST DALAI LAMA? $145k (July 7th)
26. CHAVELA $142k (October 4th)
27. HARE KRISHNA THE MANTRA THE MOVEMENT THE SWAMI WHO STARTED IT ALL $133k (June 16th)
28. DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME 132k (October 2nd)
The best documentary of the year did rather well for a Bill Morrison film about silent movies!
29. CITY OF GHOSTS $128k (July 7th)
Director Matthew Heineman's last film, the Oscar-nominated Cartel Land did a more robust $700k two years ago. Documentaries about Syria struggled this year, however. Last Men in Aleppo, for instance, made only $12,696 despite rapturous critical response and award wins.
30. I CALLED HIM MORGAN $128k (March 24th)
31. MARIE CURIE: THE COURAGE OF KNOWLEDGE $127k (June 30th)
32. THE B SIDE: ELSA DORFMAN'S PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHY $125k (June 30th)
Errol Morris' other 2017 project, Wormwood, is currently scorching up Netflix playlists. We will be looking at that in the new year.
33. BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB: ADIOS $123k (May 26th)
This trouble-plagued not-quite-a-sequel to Buena Vista Social Club struggled due to the negative buzz, which made getting the word out much too difficult.
34. ABACUS: SMALL ENOUGH TO JAIL $113k (May 19th) *OSCAR NOMINATED*
35. AIDA'S SECRETS $93k (October 20th)
36. DINA $90k (October 6th)
37. TURN IT AROUND: THE STORY OF EAST BAY PUNK $70k (May 31st)
38. BILL NYE: SCIENCE GUY $69k (October 27th)
39. ALIVE AND KICKING $68k (April 7th)
40. ARCHITECTS OF DENIAL $65k (October 6th)
The only non Netflix (since they don't report grosses) film on the Oscar long-list that didn't make the top 40 box office wise were Jennifer Brea's Unrest and Feras Fayyad's Last Men in Aleppo. What does that say about anything? Well, I suspect the branch is going to really like Aleppo no matter what and it has been made widely accessable to voters. [UPDATE 1/23: Last Men was nominated... see the full updated Oscar charts here.]
Reader Comments (4)
Thanks for this. What a pleasant surprise that “I Am Not Your Negro” did so well! I hadn’t realized it. The only thing I didn’t like about that film was the weird moment beforehand where you go up to the ticket counter and say to some cashier, “I am not your Negro.” Now that I know thousands of Americans stood in line and did the same thing, it’s actually kind of a wonderful image to think of. James Baldwin would have been delighted.
^Hahahahaha...
Hedy Lamarr - always nice to see her. Great documentaries in general.
My personal top of the finalists, that I've seen this far:
1. Icarus
2. Last men in Aleppo
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3. Faces places
4. Unrest
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5. Chasing coral
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6. Abacus
7. Jane
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8. City of ghosts
9. Strong Island
10. LA 92
11. Long strange trip
Where Icarus starts from and where it ends up - amazing film. It was eyeopening and played out as a real life thriller. And so much more.
Last men in Aleppo - the white helmets are doing such an amazing job... And oh my god - the ending just made the whole film even twice as horrifying. Amazing piece of documentary.
I hope at least these 2 will make the cut.
But I really hope that Faces places,- the combination of art, friendship and the wisdom of life of an 88 year old cultural phenomenon gets a nomination also. Agnes is so cute + the toes on the train + all the other images make the nteresting enough story of a journey a real piece of art .