Crank up your favorite tunes, talk shows, podcasts, and more. The field, the court, the pitch—they are natural settings with their own built-in narratives (the comeback, the underdog, the impossible season, the town that did the unthinkable). Composed of archival footage and interviews with some of the people closest to the story, this documentary is one for anyone who finds hope in beating the odds and pushing back on hatred to achieve greatness. If you want to see the limits of the human body and spirit pushed to their absolute limits, do not pass this sports documentary up. Sport: Formula One Racing When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Of all the documentaries in ESPN's ever-popular 30 for 30 series, June 17, 1994 might just be the most ambitious. Nominated by FrustratedCentre Half, this is “a documentary about ordinary people, their passion for sport and it’s inexplicable hold over them – and the sound quality is truly astonishing”. Sports are certainly no different; and that’s what the Academy Award-winning Netflix documentary, Icarus, focuses upon. Having never won a playoff game, the Manassas Tigers and the senior class hope to turn around their school’s image as quitters and losers. In fact, for years and years there was really only one film that documented the sport. From The Last Dance to Cheer and Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez. Narrated by Sean Penn and directed by Stacy Peralta, one of the actual members of the ’70s team, this is widely considered the best skateboarding documentary of all time. It tells the story of how a skydiver named Carl Boenish took his passion to a whole new level and invented a new adrenalin packed sport which exhibits a more dangerous feat of human flight but also packs more fun for extreme thrill seekers. And these aren't just about one individual or one moment in time. Sport: Surfing And while he played for the New York Yankees, Oakland Athletics, Texas Rangers, and New York Mets, the most fascinating part of his career was his tenure on the Pittsburgh Pirates. Friend and filmmaker Jimmy Chin follows along, capturing one of the greatest stories of human discipline and achievement. However, it’s such an exceptional series with so many amazing entries that we couldn’t pick just one “episode” for our list. Director: George Butler, Robert Fiore The documentary was so magnificent, in fact, that it earned them an Academy Award. Length: 1h 45min. Director: Stacy Peralta Still, this documentary serves as a fitting tribute to one of the most magnificent drivers in the history of motorsports. It would have been easy to put The Endless Summer on our list — and it would have been fair, as that’s one of the best surfing flicks ever made. Centered around “Dogtown” — a colloquial name for the surrounding areas of Santa Monica and Venice, California — the doc follows the rise of skateboarding from a casual surfer pastime to an acrobatic sport in its own right. Fun, beautiful, and unlike any documentary before it. People like Murray and Deion Sanders, though, had their paths blazed by the one and only Bo Jackson, an incredible physical specimen who dominated the NFL and MLB simultaneously at one point in his career. And while his physical prowess and arrogance were unmatched for years, time would inevitably be his undoing — as is so often the case with athletes. However, there is a legion of books worth checking out once you’ve finished watching all these docs. Cheer takes the activity often seen as the sideshow to professional sporting events, and shows the reality: the cheer routine as the main show. Ours. This documentary chronicles the origin of the heart-pounding extreme sport, base jumping. A guide to the best sports documentaries on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video – including Icarus, Sunderland 'Til I Die and The Last Dance Or maybe it’s because this Stacy Peralta-directed flick (yes, that Stacy Peralta) more accurately illustrates that surfing isn’t just a casual sport for hippy burnouts, but rather a delicate dance between man and nature that is all-too-often violent and perilous. Length: 1h. Sport: Baseball As everyone likely already knows, even the highest levels of achievement come with dark sides. It was a tragedy that shook the racing and sports worlds alike, as — to this day — Ayrton Senna is still considered to be one of the greatest drivers to ever hit the pavement. The film tells the story … Possibly the greatest sports documentary ever made about possibly the most talented formula one racing driver in the history of the sport. It’s also one of the best documentaries of 2017, and one of the best sports movies on Netflix overall. Sport: Bodybuilding This brilliant HBO Original eschews all the usual tired footballing cliches in favour of gangsters, goals and god. The 10 best sports documentaries 1 | When We Were Kings. It’s also one of the more accessible sports around, requiring just three elements: a ball, a basket, and people who want to play it. Focusing on a pair of inner-city boys from Chicago as they go from playing street ball to college hoops and make their way toward professional basketball, this film transcends basketball and functions as a signal beacon for anyone who wanted to achieve more than they were given. Watching this is a special experience because it will … In fact, it has been nominated for a whopping 32 awards (and won 6) since it first aired in 2009. Made in America, is a dense, thorough look at the former NFL player’s life. 2. And isn’t that the heart of all sports stories? No documentary ever felt so cinematic. Director: Bruce Brown 25 Can’t-Miss Sports Documentaries. Director: Asif Kapadia Why: Probably the most anticipated sports documentary of recent years, the Last Dance" focuses on the life and career of Michael Jordan, the greatest player in the history of the NBA, and arguably the most iconic sporting figure in history. Is it a movie? Length: 1h 31min. In a way, the games mean nothing; they are only games after all. Length: 1h 42min. Length: 1h 28min. The mercurial Messi has his own episode as well. He also happens to be one of the most dominant boxers of all time — a fact bolstered by his 50 wins (44 by KO), just six losses, and the fact that he holds the record as the youngest boxer to win a heavyweight title at the age of 20. Sport: Basketball If you want to learn the full story, you’ll have to watch Deep Water yourself. Director: Aviva Kempner The series is the essence of Victory in Defeat. Ours explores how fans can help to shape the future of a game undergoing an existential crisis. If you’re interested in learning a whole lot more about it — including the good, the bad, and the heartbreaking — you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better flick on the subject than Beyond the Mat. Director: E. Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin 70 mins Available for 28 days. Then, in 1991, he did it a third time. Sport: Motorcycle Racing Length: Varying. Director: Varying Sport. Length: 1h 36min. Whatever the case, this documentary is widely considered amongst the greatest of all time, be that surfing, sporting, or otherwise. Centered around a sport now known as quad rugby (or wheelchair rugby), this intense film spins a tale about the brutal, intense, full-contact gladiatorial past time and the athletes who participate in it as they strive for a spot competing in the Paralympic Games in Athens, Greece. The best sports documentaries share a level of context that pulls on the strings of emotion and reveals the story on a deeper, more intimate level. In the film, director Bryan Fogel, an amateur biker, decides to try to dose himself with performance enhancing drugs to compete at the highest level. Learn more. Sport. The best sports documentaries and series available on Netflix right now. A five-year journey chronicling two Chicago boys as they make a run at basketball stardom, this documentary is simply legendary. Whether it be ESPN’s incredible ’30 for 30′ series or the empathetic work of Steve James, time and time again sporting documentaries prove to us that the best stories are always about real people, real emotions and real situations. The documentary—about his return from injury—is more about pride than victory. Without a doubt one of the most famous sports documentaries of all time, Icarus does a deep dive into the Russian Olympic doping program. But rather than sticking with the limited footage available and interviews, the production team decided instead to create a series of dramatizations — aided by the input of the real-life climbers themselves. These will be the fastest 10 hours of your life. Sport: American Football It’s a documentary that has all the makings of an incredible movie. The following is a quarter-century’s worth of the best sports documentaries of all time. Climber Alex Honnold attempts a free solo ascent of Yosemite National Park’s El Capitan. Director: Jeffrey Radice These are the best sports documentaries of all time. Today's Top Stories. For reference, that race was so disastrous — marked by horrible weather, rough waters, and more — only one of the participants even finished the race. 10. Sport: Ice Hockey But sometimes, the story in the background is much deeper and, arguably, even more interesting than the event itself. The Dawn Wall isn’t Solo, which just won an Oscar for best documentary earlier in 2019. Sport: Varying Many of the best sports documentaries detail the darkest, and sometimes unknown, sides of greatness. However, Deep Water tells a very, very different story — focusing specifically on the world’s first solo round-the-world yacht race back in 1968. The documentary is ranked one in our list of top 10 best sports documentaries of all time in sports history. Of course, that didn’t happen without a tremendous amount of hard work, focus, and a hefty portion of luck. The 15 Best Sports Documentaries to Watch on Netflix in 2021. If you want to know more, you’ll just have to sit down and watch this one. It’s a zany tale, but with a lot of insight. Thankfully, despite its solitary nature, this flick also happens to be one of the most exceptional sports documentaries of all time — following the French Paris-Roubaix spring classic, a race notorious for its horrendously-bad track conditions. The 2016 Oscar Winner for Best Documentary Feature, O.J. Director: Henry Alex Rubin, Dana Adam Shapiro Clough - The Brian Clough Story (ITV Sport, 2009) ITV Sport tell the story of legendary football manager Brian Clough and how he lead Nottingham Forest to back-to-back European Cup success. A documentary of the 1974 heavyweight championship bout in Zaire, "The Rumble in the Jungle," between champion George Foreman and underdog challenger Muhammad Ali. It’s not a quick afternoon watch (the film clocks in at close to three hours), but boy is it one of the best ever. Of course, this isn’t merely a story of struggle. Hilarious, intoxicating, wince-inducing and intense, it's a doc you can't miss. Hosted by Colm Meaney, this is a wonderful retrospective of Jack Charlton's tenure in charge of the Republic of Ireland soccer team. On the 25 November 2020, news broke that Argentinian football legend Diego Maradona – often... Athlete A (2020). And that’s what the 1994 documentary Hoop Dreams captures brilliantly. In 1990, he did it again. Length: 1h 51min. It was the day of Arnold Palmer's final PGA round. For those who are unfamiliar, Doc Ellis was an MLB pitcher in the 1970s. 2003’s Touching the Void is undoubtedly the most questionable and controversial “documentary” on our list, as it actually concerns an event that wasn’t filmed, for it would have been impossible for climbers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates to bring cameras on their perilous trek up the west face of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985. The following is a quarter-century’s worth of the best sports documentaries of all time. Icarus is a documentary that plays like a top-shelf legal thriller with life-or-death stakes. Sport: Boxing The Paris-Bourbaix race is famous for it’s dangerous, cobbled track, and in 1976, one film crew chronicled the race from its start to its exciting finish. HiConsumption is reader-supported. Compiled from 250+ hours of footage, it is quite simply the best sports documentary ever made, and arguably the greatest sports movie period. Sport: Varying What happens when an uber-popular director/die-hard basketball fan (Spike Lee) begins a rivalry with an NBA superstar (Reggie Miller)? That was the eternal 2016 question for this 5-part, 10 hour documentary that first aired on ESPN and ABC (it ended up winning the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature). Sport: Rock Climbing Though not a “sport” in the more traditional sense of the world, bodybuilding still requires absurd amounts of physicality, focus, skill, and raw talent. Say what you will about how “real” professional wrestling is; you can’t fake falling 20 feet from the top of a steel cage onto the ground below. 1. For reference, though the name is a bit misleading and originally referred to 30 films from 30 different storytellers, this show (and its offshoots) have accounted for a whopping 157 entries and counting. Told through the eyes of the director and cyclist Bryan Fogel, this fantastic documentary delves deep into the seedy underworld of doping and illuminates a scandal that involves performance-enhancing drugs, a Russian whistleblower scientist, and Vladimir Putin himself. Sport: Quad Rugby That’s where this guide comes in; the following 20 films take a deep dive into some of the most exceptional stories in athletic history — not just the games and/or events, but every facet of the surrounding tale. 10 of the best sports films and documentaries on Netflix UK; Diego Maradona . Length: 1h 30min. Technically speaking, ESPN’s 30 for 30 is a series and not a single documentary. 2. Even if you don’t particularly care for basketball as a sport, it’s still 100% worth watching. Each episode takes on a different sport, a different athlete, and a different failure. It was a 19-day journey. These 25 best sports documentaries will make you laugh, cry, and cheer for the athletes. Sport: Professional Wrestling Here's what to watch next. Love him or hate him, there’s no denying that Mike Tyson’s story is one worth being told, for better or worse. All rights reserved, The 20 Best Sports Documentaries Of All Time. In a way, no subject lends itself better to the documentarian’s touch than sports. In 1988, Ayrton Senna, a Brazilian racing driver, won his first Formula One world championship. Director: Leon Gast | Stars: Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, Don King, James Brown. But there are a lot of stories to tell about El Capitan. Bosman. Sport documentaries have also had an … However, Riding Giants just barely edged past it for us, perhaps for its unique two-pronged approach, spanning both the sweeping history of surfing itself as well as more intimate looks at the real individuals involved. And that’s just one example of the intense athleticism required for this performative sport. However, it would never be what it is today without the pioneering athletes on the Zephyr skating team from the 1970s. Using only archival footage, … Expectations are high for ESPN's upcoming 30 for 30 documentary, O.J. Once Were Lions. That being said, it’s no less a marvelous tale of daring, disaster, and just how far men will go to survive. While we're sure we missed a couple of your favorites, these are the ones that still get us hyped. 2011’s Undefeated is one such story, circling an inner-city football team in Memphis, Tennessee, and their volunteer coach dedicated to helping the team beat the odds both on and off the field. The Fab Five (2011) In no particular order, here are the best sports documentaries of all time. Pele, Argentina and the Dictators. Its the site of our transformations and the rituals of passage. Hope you have enjoyed the list. What you might not know, however, is that this documentary is the work of legendary director Bruce Brown — the same fellow that directed fabled surf doc The Endless Summer along with a slew of other flicks. Narrated by Sean Penn and directed by Stacy Peralta, one of the actual members of the ’70s team, this is widely considered the best skateboarding documentary of all time. Acclaimed feature-length sports documentaries from our award-winning team. The 15 Best Sports Documentaries on Netflix, Scottie Pippen Is Unhappy With 'The Last Dance', ESPN Will Start Airing 'The Last Dance' in April, The 'Last Dance' Soundtrack Is Absolutely Perfect, A Reminder of Michael Jordan's Unbelievable Stats. I don’t want to divulge too much about this one because it has to be watched to be understood. Bad news for Knicks fans, that's what. Length: 1h 53min. Death of a Gentleman (Amazon Prime) This particular film gives an unprecedented and unrivaled look at some of the most intimate, exasperating, and excruciating parts of this legendary race. Best Sports Documentaries on YouTube: Soccer: Jack Charlton: The Irish Years. Sport: Skateboarding If you’ve seen or heard of the movie Boyhood, think of that but in documentary form with this flick. Though he is most famous for his ocean-focused films, this one actually focuses on and captures the world of motorcycle racing in a way that no other documentary before or since has managed to replicate. In 2008, the then-retired and convicted Tyson reflected on his life in and outside the ring. A fascinating Oulipo -like exercise in constrained art, the director Asif Kapadia chose to construct his... 3 | … We may earn a commission through links on our site. Maybe the best football documentary ever filmed. 83 Metascore. The pacing is unmatched in this one. This Performance Coach Is Lowering the Bar. Besides the fight itself, this is a story of legendary promoter Don King, dictator of Zaire (the African country in which the match took place), and a massive music festival featuring some of the top black performers in the world at the time. A brilliant documentary can turn audiences into activists; it can awaken, alarm and amuse. Sure, the main event is the game, match, or whatever else you want to call it. Before Jackie Robinson rocked the world as the first African American to play professional baseball, a Jewish man by the name of Hank Greenberg walked a surprisingly similar path. And into the uproarious age of the 60s and 70s. Documentary offering unprecedented access to the hidden world of elite gymnasts in Russia. Bryan Fogel set out to investigate (read: test out) the use of steroids in professional cycling. The George Best of the green baize, Alex Higgins is another subject whose tempestuous life gives plenty to the documentary-maker. Yet, somehow, they did it and they won. Muhammed Ali (formerly Cassius Clay) was always destined for greatness. HiConsumption was established by gearheads for gearheads as a modern day men’s lifestyle publication, uncovering the greatest products in adventure, tech, gear, automotive, and style. Length: 1h 40min. This Academy Award winner for Best Documentary is a great example of how sports can be the best way into otherwise cloistered or untellable stories. This documentary features extensive interviews with a number of Clough's former players. Consider this series the Friday Night Lights of English football. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io, Tom Brady Trolls Coach Bruce Arians With 'Tattoo', 'Star Wars: The Bad Batch' Gives Hint in Trailer, Travis Barker's Daughter Covered His Face Tattoos, Aldis Hodge Is Looking Jacked for 'Black Adam', Avengers Theory Says Falcon Has Already Been Cap, Eric Andre's 'Bad Trip' Was Filmed a While Ago, Chris Evans Says Nobody Else Can Play Iron Man, The 11 Best Cooking Shows on Netflix Right Now, 15 Serial Killer Shows to Watch After Mindhunter, Winning Time: Reggie Miller vs. the New York Knicks (2010), Late Life: The Chien-Ming Wang Story (2018). Length: 1h 30min. Director: Stacy Peralta It’s a bit dated, to be sure, but there is still no other weightlifting-focused documentary that comes close — aside from, perhaps, the whistleblowing Bigger, Faster, Stronger, which looks at bodybuilding from a darker, steroid-fueled angle. Director: Leon Gast Told from an intimate perspective, each of the entries in this series takes an impressively-deep dive into different sports stories (or stories that touch on the world of sports) from around the world — including (but not limited to) things like the Miami Hurricanes, OJ Simpson’s infamous high-speed chase, a cautionary tale of the SMU football debacle, and so much more. Watch now Read more. The Greatest Sports Documentaries of All Time Diego Maradona (2019). It’s about people and places, attitudes, ideas, and drives. It’s not just a game; it’s an escape; it’s pure possibility. Sport: Cycling Director: Kevin Macdonald This docuseries turns competition on its head and chronicles the failures, the almost-greats, the ones who came up short. Not every sport-focused story worth telling has been turned into a good documentary. However, there is one problem with live sports: you’re never really getting the whole story. Unfortunately, we’ll never get to see what he could have achieved had he lived longer. This documentary is a musical festival, featuring the America’s top black sportsmen like James Brown and B.B King and so on. And in this way, the sports story isn’t really a story about sports at all. No less inspiring than Honnold’s El Capitan ascent is that made by climber Tommy Caldwell, the first to free climb El Cap. Climbing to any peak is always very difficult and requires considerable effort. Sport: Yacht Racing Nominated by FrustratedCentre Half, this is “a documentary about ordinary people, their passion for sport and it’s inexplicable hold over them – and the sound quality is truly astonishing”. You know how it ends, but your palms still get super sweaty watching. Combining original 16mm footage shot by the actual racers themselves while out on the open ocean, audio recordings, after-the-fact interviews, and more, the story focuses specifically on one racer, Donald Crowhurst, who was forced to choose between abandoning the race to return home bankrupt and defeated or to continue onward aboard an unfinished, leaky boat. The result: one hell of a character study. Sport: Boxing Type keyword (s) to search. Just a year or so ago, Alex Honnold became a household name. If you’re a detractor of the pro wrestling world, give this film a watch and it may very well change your opinion forever. Length: 1h 28min. Director: Daniel Lindsay, T.J. Martin An acclaimed documentary from BT Sport Films which celebrates one of English football’s greatest ever goalscorers, Jimmy Greaves.. Greavsie is a rags-to-riches story filled with pain and glory. For many, that's why The Last Dance, which centered on NBA great Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls of the 1990s, was such a perfect watch. Sign up for the Complex Newsletter for breaking news, events, and unique stories. His lifelong dream and one of the most exceptional feats of human athleticism, the entire experience was documented masterfully by filmmakers E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin. Though the story is absolutely true, this flick is almost more of a political thriller than a straightforward documentary — which adds to the entertainment factor. Director: Steve James However, one of his most remarkable achievements came when he was at the age of 32 and considered to be well past his prime. Check out the best ones on our list of the greatest sports books of all time. You think you need talking heads? So it was almost compulsory to add his aptly-named Tyson documentary to this list. And it was the day that OJ Simpson took off in his white Ford Bronco. Length: 2h 50min. And, along with plenty of archival footage, it features appearances by some of skateboarding’s biggest names — including Tony Alva, Steve Caballero, Jay Adams, and so many more. Into baseball. Basketball is celebrated around the world as one of the greatest sports of all time. Before he could take another title, however, Senna perished in a crash while leading the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix in front of an audience of 300 million people. Are you impressed with Kyler Murray? And it’s an honor that’s rightly deserved, as he was the first person ever to climb the sheer 3,000-foot face of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park completely without any ropes, anchors, or any other support safety gear. After the 2016-2017 season, Sunderland FC was relegated from the Premiere League to the Championship League, one of the biggest defeats for any top-tier English soccer club. Length: 1h 26min. From the same documentarian as Touching the Void, Deep Water reconstructs the 1968 yachting race known as the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race. It was a real David and Goliath story, as the Americans weren’t ever expected to make it as far as they did, let alone take the #1 spot atop the podium. Though in the post-Lance Armstrong world, cycling is recognized and celebrated around the globe as a legitimate sport, it wasn’t always this way.