We could write something really meaningful about documentaries and how they impacted the decade, changed our lives, made us cry, made us angry, gave us a call to action, or shined a light on something we otherwise might not know about. We could talk about the portraits of people we adored, people we lost, or chronicles of injustice or venality or obscure spotlights on little-known subjects. And we’ll do that, eventually, but right now, it’s Friday, and we just want to sleep and drink and possibly never wake up, so please enjoy our Best Documentaries of The Decade feature, this placeholder we may or may not update when we’re feeling alive, and our genuine thanks and appreciation for all your reading, sharing, clicking, etc.

Continue reading The Best Documentaries Of The Decade [2010s] at The Playlist.

There was a time when documentary filmmaking felt a little bit like the red-headed stepchild of the film industry, and, to be sure, they still tend not to challenge fiction features at the box office unless they’re furiously topical political manifestos like “March of the Penguins,” awe-inspiring testaments to the grandeur of nature like “Jackass 3D” or gross-out slapstick like “Fahrenheit 9/11.” But the rise of streaming services, and the fall of Western democracy, have given non-fiction filmmaking a new lease on life: not only are the incisive and dedicated perspectives of documentarians of all stripes more necessary than ever now to help us make sense of an increasingly senseless world, they also tend to be more available to us than ever before.

Continue reading The Best Documentaries Of 2017 at The Playlist.

If there isn’t already, there ought to be an improbably long German compound word to describe the slightly panicky, drowning feeling of overwhelmed anticipation that is one’s natural state when contemplating just how much good TV there is out there — and that’s even before additional shows like this week’s “GLOW” and “The Mist” have been piled onto the queue. Add in an appreciation of just how few hours there are in a day, and just how much “other stuff” one is supposed to be doing with one’s life, and the prospect of even making a dent in the mountain of unwatched Golden Age TV can actually trigger a full-blown panic attack.

Continue reading The 25 Best TV Shows Of 2017 So Far at The Playlist.

With the massive successes of “The Jinx” and “Making a Murderer,” the true crime docuseries is a hot commodity right now. The newest true crime binge-watch is “The Keepers” on Netflix. The docuseries covers the 1969 murder of a nun in Baltimore. However, it seems like there was also another plot thread in the series that was explored but never made it to the screen.

Continue reading ‘The Keepers’ Director Edited Out A Whole Other Murder at The Playlist.

Who killed Sister Cathy? That’s the question on everyone’s mind in the first trailer for Netflix‘s “The Keepers,” a new documentary film about the 1969 murder of Cathy Cesnik, a nun and English teacher at Keough High School in Baltimore, Maryland. The mysterious nature of Cesnik’s death — and the institutional corruption that led to her tragic end — are the focus of Ryan White‘s (“Serena,” “The Case Against 8“) newest film, already being pitched by Netflix as 2015’s answer to their hit series “Making A Murderer.”

READ MORE: The 30 Most Anticipated New TV Shows Of 2017

Those who want to spoil themselves on the series — if it’s possible to spoil yourself on historical events, I suppose — would do well to read “Buried in Baltimore: The Mysterious Murder of a Nun Who Knew Too Much,” the longform report published by The Huffington Post in 2015 that explores the city and some of the events surrounding Cesnik’s murder.

Continue reading Netflix Promises Another True-Crime Hit With Its First Trailer For ‘The Keepers’ at The Playlist.