美国国家公共电台 NPR The Documentary Is In — And Enjoying — An 'Undeniable Golden Age'（在线收听）

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

Documentaries are having a moment. At Sundance last month, Netflix reportedly paid $10 million for "Knock Down The House." It broke the film festival's documentary sales record. The film follows the campaigns of four female congressional candidates, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "KNOCK DOWN THE HOUSE")

ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ: I am proud to be an American, but we have to rise to that promise.

SHAPIRO: NPR's Mandalit del Barco reports that biographical docs have grown in popularity, along with budgets and profits.

MANDALIT DEL BARCO, BYLINE: Here's what's up with docs. They're doing great at the box office. That really impresses producer Sheila Nevins, who ran HBO Documentary Films for 36 years and is considered one of the most influential people in the business.

SHEILA NEVINS: It was a real hot year for films making money. I mean, money money. Docu - when I say films, I mean docus - docus making real money, and docus got very hot.

DEL BARCO: "Free Solo," the story of Alex Honnold's climb to the peak of Yosemite's El Capitan without ropes, is still climbing at the box office. So far, it's earned almost $16 million. Box Office Mojo ranks it in the top 20 most profitable documentaries. The National Geographic film is a front-runner for the documentary feature Oscar. So is "RBG," a portrait of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "RBG")

RUTH BADER GINSBURG: I am 84 years old, and everyone wants to take a picture with me.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Notorious RBG, yeah, yeah.

DEL BARCO: "RBG" has earned $14 million at the box office, putting it in the top 25 highest-earning docs category. Directors Julie Cohen and Betsy West, both former TV journalists, see documentaries as a counternarrative to the quick short media world of Twitter and social media.

JULIE COHEN: People, actually, it turns out, will sit down for an hour and a half and really get engrossed in a true story film.

BETSY WEST: We're very excited about that, especially the opportunity to tell stories that really have been ignored over the years.

DEL BARCO: "RBG" is also competing for an Oscar against "Minding The Gap" and "Hale County This Morning, This Evening" and "Fathers And Sons."

THOM POWERS: It's an undeniable golden age for documentary filmmaking right now.

DEL BARCO: Tom Powers is host of the podcast "Pure Nonfiction." He's also a programmer for the Toronto International Film Festival.

POWERS: For a long time, there was a bit of a stigma around documentaries that, you know, it was going to be educational or it was going to be a bummer or it was definitely not going to be a date-night movie.

DEL BARCO: Power says all that has changed, especially with streaming platforms like Netflix and iTunes making documentaries more accessible. Powers watches as many as 500 documentaries a year. He says the popularity has spurred streaming services to fund documentaries like never before.

POWERS: That ability to reach such a large audience is a dream for most filmmakers. However, you know, another big dream for most filmmakers is to see their work on a big screen, not to be watched on, you know, someone's smartphone during a commute.

DEL BARCO: For one week in March, the giant-screened IMAX theaters will present "Apollo 11," a new documentary about the historic 1969 moon landing.

(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "APOLLO 11")

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: We're go for landing.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Houston, you are go for landing - over.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: Roger, understand, go for landing (ph).

DEL BARCO: NASA gave director Todd Douglas Miller access to hundreds of reels of never-before-seen 50-year-old footage, some in 70 mm, plus 11,000 hours of audio from Apollo 11, which was painstakingly synched with the visuals.

TODD DOUGLAS MILLER: There's no narration. There's no talking heads - nothing that takes place modern day. It's an all-archival experience.

DEL BARCO: Miller says he cut different versions of "Apollo 11" for different platforms.

MILLER: I would love for everybody to watch this on an IMAX screen, you know? It's been calibrated that will be the best place to watch it, but I'm a realist. I know where the industry is going. And it's amazing to see on a small screen, too.

URSULA MACFARLANE: And the thing is you just want a maximum number of people to see it.

DEL BARCO: Director Ursula MacFarlane and producer Poppy Dixon are talking about their documentary "Untouchable." It's about the rise and fall of movie producer Harvey Weinstein, who denies all allegations of nonconsensual sex and criminality. The film includes testimonies of his alleged rape victims, such as possible aware that

(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "UNTOUCHABLE")

PAZ DE LA HUERTA: I was intimidated by him and his power.

DEL BARCO: Dixon says they're looking forward to it being shown in theaters.

POPPY DIXON: There's something about, you know, if you're sitting in a darkened cinema and you can't go anywhere, you can't look away from the testimony of these women. And I think that that is a really powerful thing.

DEL BARCO: While filmmakers and audiences are showing enthusiasm for the cinematic experience, Sheila Nevins says this trend could change.

NEVINS: I mean, Netflix is all over the place, playing with Monopoly money, buying up everything. Every network is doing docus. Every docu person I know has more than one job. It's just a great year for docus. But, you know, things are cyclical. I think there's too much product.

DEL BARCO: The real challenge remains - finding time to watch it all. Mandalit del Barco, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF THE LIMINANAS SONG, "(I'VE GOT) TROUBLE IN MIND")