2016 Documentary Appreciation Thread: Your Top 5 ( and mine )

Below are what I consider my top 5 favorites I've seen this year. They have scattered release dates, naturally, but 2016 is when I got around to them.

I encourage others to do your Top 5 to provide others, like me, good leads on don't miss docs. They're my favorite category.

5. Audie & Daisy 2 teens girls who experienced online harassment and its affect on their lives. For me, it made me think more deeply about the social layers older parents like me have to be aware of compared to growing up in the 80's. Powerful.

4. Tony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru I'm not big on motivational speakers. This film had all the elements why I'm not... Expensive seminar. Playing on participant emotion. If you can see it you can be it concepts. But it took it further, IMO. Robbins took his people further than I knew he would. Forcing choice. Freeing old ghosts. Cursing like a summabitch. Overall I truly enjoyed something I thought I wouldn't which is always a plus.

3. Queen Mimi Circumstances left Mimi homeless decades ago. She began living in a laundromat simply to have a roof over her head. She's just a lovely woman who became everyone's friend and eventually, Grandma. I have this at 3 because I sincerely feel we all know or could get to know a Mimi. They're out there and they're poor but wonderful people.

2. Treblinka: Death Camp Survivor Stories The only two remaining survivors of the death camp retell their stories. Watching them relive their experience in such detail I experienced that sort of numb feeling we sometimes get when being transported by a story. The time when the credits roll, you just sit with a blank expression and don't remember blinking your eyes the entire movie. You're not frowning or crying, you're something else. Somewhere else.

1. Winter On Fire: Ukraine's Fight For Freedom Many of you have seen it, I'm certain. I watched it during the GE months and I thought to myself how lucky we are compared to what Ukranians endured simply to be heard or treated with dignity. The film popped into my head for weeks during our election cycle. Incredible footage, interviews and story in story following. This one will stay with you for a long long time.