the 5 films up for best documentary at the 2025 Oscars

The Academy Awards represent the screen industry’s biggest annual global recognition for the very best of moviemaking. And in these troubled times, many recognise the power of documentaries to transform the world for the better.

Like last year, the 2025 nominations for Best Documentary are international in their scope, continuing an Academy trend of placing more emphasis on voices outside of the United States.

This year’s nominations feature a few milestones: it’s the first time a Japanese filmmaker has been put forward, and the first time an Indigenous North American filmmaker has been nominated in Oscars history.

All exhibit outstanding craftsmanship while exploring intense themes. The following roundup will hopefully encourage you to check them out at the cinema or online, and see why the experts also think they deserve the top gong.

Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat

Johan Grimonprez’s experimental essay examines the Cold War politics of the 1950s and 60s. At this time, many African nations were gaining independence from their colonial masters.

In Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat, the uranium and mineral rich Democratic Republic of the Congo becomes a poignant case study.

As the first prime minister Patrice Lumumba breaks the country away from Belgian rule, a murderous plot by global superpowers to destroy the country’s newfound sovereignty unfolds.

And underneath it all: the frenetic beat of jazz as a revolutionary reaction against racism on both sides of the Atlantic.

A wealth of archival material featuring former world leaders, the Congolese situation, and the musical stylings of Nina Simone, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong and others make this documentary effortlessly cool. The edit and sound design has a wonderful syncopated rhythm, revealing fascinating facets of modern history and the scramble for power.

Sugarcane

St. Joseph’s Mission was a residential school for Indigenous children in Canada, which closed in 1981.

When ground penetrating radar begins looking for unmarked graves at the school, Julian Brave NoiseCat – whose father was born on the site – and co-director Emily Kassie embark on a quest of accountability for a myriad of institutional abuses.

Editors Nathan Punwar and Maya Daisy Hawke interweave archival reels alongside Emily Kassie and Christopher LaMarca’s stark verité cinematography. The film captures members of the Williams Lake First Nation community reckoning with generations of trauma at the hands of Catholic clergy.

Together, they present some disturbing facts in the film, which won a directing award at the Sundance Film Festival.

National Geographic has routinely received a documentary Oscar nomination. This film is a challenging topic for Australian and New Zealand audiences. We also have a troubling history with the placement of Aboriginal children in homes, where many faced hardships and mistreatment.

Sugarcane gives a platform for truth-telling and healing.

Porcelain War

Ceramists Slava Leontyev and Anya Stasenko are inspired by the nature of Ukraine and each other. Their friend, and fellow creator, Andrey Stefanov documents their lives on tape after his wife and children flee at the start of the Russian invasion.

All become involved in active defiance.

The film combines nonprofessional video, body cams and drone footage alongside wildlife photography and charming animations of Anya’s delicate paintings on clay.

There are gripping scenes of armed conflict from the viewpoint of Slava’s squad of reservists. These are everyday folks who have become involved in fighting on the ground.

Porcelain War benefits from a soundtrack composed and performed by folk music quartet DakhaBrakha. This adds an eerie texture to this portrait of hope.

The film thoughtfully balances light and shade with grace, demonstrating that art remains a potent way to oppose erasure.

Black Box Diaries

When her high-profile #MeToo sexual assault case is dropped on the grounds of insufficient evidence, Japanese journalist, director and producer Shiori Itō commences chronicling her journey to justice.

Deploying abstract imagery over recorded conversations with investigators and witnesses, Itō builds her argument over several years. The passage of time is interspersed with her unfiltered video diary entries.

There has been controversy about the director including hotel footage of her drugged and being dragged out of a taxi by her attacker, senior reporter Noriyuki Yamaguchi, without permission. Itō had been given the footage for the legal case, but had agreed it would not be used outside of the courtroom.

The debate has prevented the film from showing on Japanese screens. However, Itō has argued the public good of using this material outweighs commercial interests – especially considering the pressure of Yamaguchi’s influential connections to quell the case, which include then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

Itō doesn’t shy away from exposing the raw emotional depths of her remarkably brave undertaking against fierce odds, and she serves as an inspiring change-maker we should all heed.

No Other Land

No Other Land takes stock of the West Bank situation from the perspective of Basel Adra, who documents evictions of Palestinians in his home village of Masafer Yatta.

Basel works with journalist Yuval Abraham to bear witness to the army’s gradual destruction of his village to make way for a military training ground.

No Other Land features some great observational camerawork with many poetic images of resilience. Things kick up a notch when a villager, Harun, is shot by Israeli soldiers while trying to confiscate his building tools. Basel is targeted for filming the ensuing protests – but Adra and Abraham continue undeterred.

A friendship develops amid the chaos between the Palestinian activist and Israeli reporter, who co-direct and edit with Hamdan Ballal and Rachel Szor. It’s the touching humanity of their relationship that goes to the core of the film; compassion is key to deescalating tensions in the region.

In Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand, Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat, Porcelain War, Black Box Diaries and No Other Land are streaming on DocPlay; Sugarcane is streaming on Disney+.