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From an examination of skateboarding and toxic masculinity to a stranger-than-fiction tale of triplets separated at birth, portraits of Jane Fonda, Whitney Houston, Fred Rogers and more, here were the best non-fiction films of the year.

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00:00It's been a stellar year for documentary film, both in terms of subject matter and

00:04box office revenue, and THR critics are weighing in on which ones they liked best.

00:08From a portrait of a tragic American icon gone too soon, to a bizarre tale of triplets

00:13separated at birth for experimental purposes, to the story of a character beloved by

00:18children the nation over, we take a look at five of the non-fiction films that

00:21fascinated our critics.

00:23I never felt real. I just thought, I've got to find who I really am.

00:28Sherry Linden acknowledges that there is nothing exactly earth-shattering in the

00:32psychological portrait of Jane Fonda, whose legendary career spends more than five

00:35decades, but enthuses, when you get right down to it, Fonda is exceedingly good company,

00:40a commanding storyteller who's still at 80, thoroughly absorbed in not just her

00:45screenwork and social causes, but the essential business of sorting out a

00:49legacy of pain from a childhood of gothic horror.

00:52I wouldn't consider myself politically active. It just seems like a lot of fighting.

00:58Linden also loved Robert Green's Bisbee 17, an examination of the Bisbee deportation in

01:05Arizona, which saw 1,200 striking miners kidnapped by 2,000 deputized men in cattle

01:10cars and dispatched 16 hours later in New Mexico. Says Linden,

01:14Green's bracing doc, a sort of dark, stylized American answer to the doc's better colo about

01:19an Italian town's tradition of staging annual plays about itself, stirs up questions rather

01:24than answer them, and its contemporary resonance couldn't be clearer.

01:27People think it's so easy, but it's not.

01:31You got class, you got salt on the ground.

01:33According to David Rooney, Kevin MacDonald's haunting, richly contextualized documentary

01:37portrait celebrates the pop supernova, who became a one-woman hit factory in the 80s and 90s.

01:42However, as to be expected for a tale that we know ends in tragedy, Rooney says it delves more

01:48deeply into the troubled persona behind the prodigiously talented star, bedeviled by issues of image and

01:54identity, sexuality, and childhood trauma that became combustible under the pressures of a bad

01:59marriage, a drug habit, and a stinging betrayal by the father she idolized. All in all, Rooney

02:04praises the film as an American tragedy explored with sensitivity and probing complexity.

02:09I've always felt that I didn't need to put on a funny hat or jump through the hoop to have a

02:15relationship with a child. Daniel Feinberg finds himself in a bit of a dilemma with one of his

02:20favorites, explaining,

02:27Speaking of the film that celebrates adored children's television host Mr. Rogers, who wanted

02:31to help children through some of the difficult modulations of life, Feinberg raves over and

02:36over, clips prove the faith Rogers put in kids. And again and again, the doc features shots of

02:40worshipful fans interacting with him that prove his confidence was rewarded.

02:44Another of David Rooney's picks is Three Identical Strangers, the story of three identical

02:53triplets who were separated at birth for an experiment and grew up oblivious to each other's

02:57existence. Says our critic, Tim Wardle's film starts out like a jaunty sitcom, featuring three

03:02likable lugs with toothy grins who look like they were cloned from Andy Samberg. But as the euphoria of

03:08reconnection subsides and disconcerting questions arise, a mystery freighted with disturbing ethical

03:13violations unfolds. This is a distressing story touched by tragedy told in a brisk, absorbing

03:19package. To read our critics' full list of their choice for the 10 best documentaries of 2018,

03:24head to THR.com. For The Hollywood Reporter News, I'm Lindsay Rodriguez.

The Best Documentaries of 2018 According to Hollywood Reporter Critics | THR News

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