I want to rent some really good documentaries on my Netflix account. What would you recommend?
My favorite documentary films include Celluloid Closet, Paradise Lost (the West Memphis 3 documentaries), Terry Jones’ CRUSADES, and, of course Ken Burns’ CIVIL WAR. (I understand that the documentary COSMOS is back in print at long last.)
Anything you’ve seen that you’d recommend on any subject is fine-
Kenneth Clarke’s (Clarkes?) Civilization.
James Burke Connections. The first one only.
Ken Burns Baseball.
You also might want to go here for some more ideas.
Atomic Cafe.
Titticut Follies.
Woodstock.
Occurrence At Owk Creek Bridge. 
Probably the best documentary I’ve ever seen is Crumb. I actually had never even heard of the cartoonist Robert Crumb before seeing it, and yet I was still completely and totally glued the whole way through. Brilliantly done.
By far the best documentary I’ve ever seen is Salesman by the Maysles Brothers (they also did the Stones documentary concert Gimme Shelter). Salesman is available in the Criterion Collection.
Other great ones:
Burden of Dreams
The Man With a Movie Camera
The Memphis Belle (the original WWII documentary)
The Mystery of Picasso
The Thin Blue Line
When We Were Kings
The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl
The first Connections series by James Burke (the second one is good too, but the first series is the best)
James’ brother Ric did New York: A Documentary, which was great too.
Waaaaaait just a cotton-pickin’ minute here.
Crumb and The Thin Blue Line aren’t documentaries. They’re docudramas. I mean, would you count Apollo 13 and Goodfellas as documentaries, just because they contained re-enactments of historical events?
Nanook of the North.
It’s remarkable, especially considering the level of technology in the 1920’s. I’ve seen it only one time, when I was stoned to the bone, and I still remember most of it clearly. The dude who shot it was a genius.
I thought Hoop Dreams was fantastic.
Shoah is beyond good, even if you can’t sit through it all at once.
Gates of Heaven is a good one too.
Even though the documentarian was a bit patronizing towards his subject, American Movie is excellent. It chronicles a small-town guy making a no-budget horror movie with friends.
For all those who have seen American Movie, I just want to say that I was amazed at how good “Coven”'s cinematography was. For a guy working with such a paltry amount of money (as far as movie-making is concerned), he was able to pull of some fantastic shots (I’m thinking the cupboard scene).
–greenphan
No, you wait any cotton-pickin’ length of time you desire, but Crumb is most certainly a documentary. It is not scripted like the docudramas that you cite.
(Haven’t seen The Thin Blue Line yet, though I intend to, being a Philip Glass fan. Or am I mixing it up with The Thin Red Line?)
I’ll also add, if you dig the beatniks, The Source.
Crumb is certainly a documentary. It’s also fucking brilliant.
Although The Thin Blue Line included a few controversial “re-enactments”, it is most certainly a documentary also (and yes, Moe, Philip Glass did do the score).
Anothber vote for Crumb; another (or is it the first?) vote for Gimme Shelter.
Hoop Dreams
Roger & Me
Best Boy, by far.
Roger and Me is second.
I know a lot of people tend to shy away from World War II documentaries, but allow me to suggest Into The Arms Of Strangers - Stories Of The Kindertransport. Excellent. The DVD contains commentary that’s almost as good as the film itself. It won the Academy Award.
Also, If you like Ken Burns, you amy like his brother Ric’s The Donner Party. I did.
I liked A History of Britan by Simon wassaguysname
and Walking with Dinosaurs had some really cool CG.