In the heart of Paris’s intellectual elite, Catherine Robbe-Grillet has long been an enigmatic and provocative figure. The widow of celebrated novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet, she has written several books, some highly controversial for their explicit eroticism.
In The Ceremony, Swedish director Lina Mannheimer explores Robbe-Grillet’s world of refined sadomasochism, where ritual and sensuality intertwine with philosophy.
Through interviews and elegantly staged scenes, the film reveals a woman unafraid to follow her desires to their deepest, most primal limits. Among the most striking stories is that of Beverly Charpentier, thirty years her junior, who signs a lifelong contract of obedience to her mistress. A daring reflection on power, freedom and the ways society trains us to repress our instincts.
Flora Schvartzman, a sharp-witted ninety-year-old woman, has wanted to die since the day she was born, or so she says. Living alone and estranged from her family, she reconnects with them to plan her own death.
Her great-nephew Iair becomes fascinated by her peculiar sense of humor and her defiant attitude toward mortality.
Flora’s Life Is No Picnic is both absurd and deeply moving: a portrait of an eccentric woman facing the end of life with honesty, irony, and unexpected tenderness.
What connects New York, Mumbai, Moscow, and Mexico City?
Director Michael Glawogger dives into the underbelly of these vast urban landscapes to uncover the stories of those living on the edge of progress.
In Megacities, twelve chapters portray unforgettable characters, a heroin-addicted con artist, children living in sewers, a mother working in a red-light bar, a garbage collector dreaming of football glory.
Shot by Wolfgang Thaler, the film’s vivid cinematography turns urban chaos into hypnotic visual poetry. This is the first part of Glawogger’s trilogy about the global margins of society, a powerful testament to the resilience of human life.
Filmed over the course of a year in Aurora Kindergarten in Norway, Childhood offers a rare, unhurried view of children aged one to seven as they explore, play, and grow freely.
The film challenges conventional views on education and child development, showing a world where imagination rules and time moves at a natural pace.
Director Margreth Olin describes the work as “a silent protest”, a gentle yet radical reminder that children need space, not structure, to truly flourish.
Told by Sebastián Marroquín, born Juan Pablo Escobar, son of the infamous Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar, Sins of My Father transforms a story of crime into one of reconciliation.
Directed by Nicolás Entel, the film interweaves rare home footage with intimate reflections on guilt, forgiveness, and identity.
The emotional peak comes when Marroquín meets the sons of two politicians his father had murdered, a powerful act of healing that transcends decades of pain.
Premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival, this documentary stands out as one of the most human and sobering portrayals of violence and legacy.
Each night in Silicon Valley, the bus on route 22 becomes a mobile shelter for the homeless.
Director Elizabeth Lo captures this nocturnal routine with an observational, minimalist approach. Inside the metallic belly of the bus, strangers rest, argue, and dream as the city of innovation sleeps outside.
The mechanical hum of the vehicle becomes a soundtrack of survival, a stark contrast to the world of wealth just beyond its windows. Hotel 22 is a quiet, haunting reflection on inequality in the age of technology.
Another masterwork from Michael Glawogger, Workingman’s Death examines the meaning of labor in the modern world.
Through six striking vignettes, from miners in Ukraine to steelworkers in China, the film depicts the physical and emotional toll of work at its most extreme.
Visually stunning and philosophically rich, it explores what remains of heroism and dignity in an era of automation and economic disparity.
Premiered at the Venice Film Festival, it remains one of the most uncompromising studies of humanity’s relationship with labor.
In Sodiq, British filmmaker Adeyemi Michael revisits a young man he once knew from his London neighborhood of Peckham.
Sodiq dreamed of becoming a doctor but instead ended up sentenced to thirty years in prison for murder.
Through interviews with family, friends, and community members, the film examines how environment, identity, and opportunity collide in shaping a life’s trajectory.
An intimate and heartbreaking portrait of potential lost to violence.
Czech writer Daniel lives with an attraction that society rejects, he is a pedophile who has chosen to remain celibate.
Directed by Veronika Lišková, Daniel’s World addresses one of the last major taboos of the Western world without sensationalism.
Through candid therapy sessions and encounters with others who share his struggle, the film opens a difficult but necessary conversation about empathy, ethics, and self-control.
It’s an unsettling yet humane look at loneliness and the search for understanding in a judgmental world.
Enea, a young Italian man on the autism spectrum, works in a textile factory, spends time with his best friends, and dreams of finding love.
When his efforts to meet women fail, his friends, including filmmaker Carlo Zoratti, decide to help him on a road trip across Europe to seek intimacy and connection.
The Special Need unfolds as a heartfelt coming-of-age journey, part road movie, part emotional discovery.
A touching, humorous, and deeply human film that challenges our assumptions about desire and difference.
Note: Naturally, the documentaries that have been available for longer on GuideDoc have had more opportunities to be watched. This list doesn’t rank them from most to least viewed — it simply brings together the ten titles that audiences have returned to again and again over the years.
These ten films capture the essence of GuideDoc, stories of resilience, vulnerability, and truth told through the power of documentary cinema. Each one has resonated deeply with viewers worldwide, proving that reality, when told with honesty and artistry, can be more compelling than fiction.
2275 films
And a new one every day
The preferred platform
of true documentary lovers
Half of all revenue goes
directly to the filmmakers
