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With a new year comes another round of new documentaries to savor. More than ever, the documentary has become an essential form of communication, grounding us in a moment while providing historical context and nuance.

This year’s spate of entries at Sundance, the unofficial pipeline of the genre, ensures a steady flow of films throughout the spring and beyond. Among 2025’s most promising selections are portraits of female icons, a film adaptation of a political broadside against neoliberalism, and a muckraking investigation into the world’s richest man. Here is a list of 11 for your consideration.

The 2021 limited-release documentary about punk iconoclast and Anglo-Somali riot grrrl Marianne Elliott-Said, a.k.a. Poly Styrene, has finally found its way to US streaming platforms. But the film is more than simply another entry in the women-in-punk subgenre, popularized by recent portraits of Kathleen Hanna, Suzi Q, and The Slits. Codirected and narrated by Celeste Bell, Elliot-Said’s daughter, the film centers on a tumultuous mother-daughter relationship. It also features voiceover from actress Ruth Negga, reading from the punk musician’s diaries.