The Solzy Awards for Documentaries in 2025 honor the best of the documentary films that were released during the past year.

I’m a bit later in announcing the Solzy Awards for Documentaries because of how the Jewish holidays fell this year. Because of going from TIFF directly into the Jewish holidays, it made for a busier November than usual with having to catch up on movies that I missed due to festival or press screenings taking place during the chagim. And even then, there were still some documentaries that I meant to watch, but for one reason or another, timing just did not work out with my schedule.

I saw a way-too-early screening of Morgan Neville’s Paul McCartney documentary, Man on the Run, but since I didn’t watch it as a festival screening, I’m not counting it for my awards this year. It’s too early to say as to whether or not it’ll be among the Solzy Awards winners next year. You’ll just have to wait and see.

The Solzy Awards for Films in 2025 will be announced later this week, probably as early as tomorrow afternoon. Because of the antisemitic terrorist attack at Bondi Beach, the need to be around Jewish community during Chanukah felt too important. Otherwise, everything would have been announced by last week at the latest.

Best Documentary Feature (TIE): Soul of a Nation, The Road Between Us

Best Multi-Part Documentary: The American Revolution

Best Celebrity Documentary (Actor) (TIE): Starring Dick Van Dyke, John Candy: I Like Me

Best Revolutionary War Documentary: The American Revolution

Best World War II/Holocaust Documentary (TIE): For the Living, This Ordinary Thing

Best Music Documentary:

• Solo Musician: Billy Joel: And So It Goes
• Festival Premiere: EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert
• Restored, Remastered, and Expanded: The Beatles Anthology

Best Political Documentary (American Politics): The Last Republican

Best Political Documentary (Israeli Politics): Soul of a Nation

Best Sports Documentary Despite Featuring the Most Evil Person in College Basketball History: We Beat the Dream Team

Best Yiddish Documentary (Festival): Swedishkayt: YidLife Crisis in Stockholm

Best Comedy Documentary (Festival): Long Live The State

Best LGBTQ Documentary (Festival): State of Firsts

Best Documentary Short (Previously Announced): Fiddler on the Moon: Judaism in Space

Unreleased Festival Movie of 2022 That STILL Really Needs a Distributor This Instant and More Eyeballs on It Because Antisemitism Is Just Really Terrible: The Conspiracy

Essential October 7 Documentaries:

• Oz’s List
• The Children of October 7
• The Road Between Us
• TORN: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on New York City Streets

The Solzy Awards for Film will be announced later this week.

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