The following past Sundance Film Festival documentaries are scheduled for release this month:
>August 1
Streaming: Disney+/Hulu
TIME AND WATER
Sundance 2026
Director:
Sara Dosa
About:
Facing the death of his country’s glaciers and the loss of his beloved grandparents, Icelandic writer Andri Snær Magnason turns his archives into a time capsule to hold what is slipping away — family, memory, time, and water.
>August 7
In Theatres
COOKIE QUEENS
Sundance 2026
Director:
Alysa Nahmias
About:
It’s Girl Scout Cookie season, and four tenacious girls strive to be a top-selling “Cookie Queen,” navigating an $800 million business in which childhood and ambition collide.
>August 14
In Theatres
AMERICAN DOCTOR
Sundance 2026
Director:
Poh Si Teng
About:
When three American doctors — Palestinian, Jewish, and Zoroastrian — enter Gaza to save lives, they find themselves caught between medicine and politics, risking everything to expose the truth.
>August 24
On TV: POV
HOW TO BUILD A LIBRARY
Sundance 2025
Director:
Maia Lekow, Christopher King
About:
Two intrepid Nairobi women decide to transform what used to be a whites-only library until 1958 into a vibrant cultural hub. Along the way, they must navigate local politics, raise millions for the rebuild, and confront the lingering ghosts of Kenya’s colonial past.
>August 28
In Theatres
HANGING BY A WIRE
Sundance 2026
Director:
Mohammed Ali Naqvi
About:
A routine school commute turns terrifying when a cable car’s wire snaps, leaving eight passengers — including six schoolboys — dangling 900 feet above a ravine in the remote Himalayan foothills. With 10 hours before the remaining cable is expected to fail, a group of rescuers races to save them.
what (not) to doc 
Dear What (not) to doc,
May I suggest that wherever you credit a director of a documentary it would be appropriate, and fair, to also credit the producer/s?
Documentaries are overwhelmingly the result of a Herculean (and often largely unpaid) effort by both a producer and a director. And I mean that regarding creative formation as well as administrative/financial.
It is no coincidence that the vast majority of doc producers have been women – a segment of our society who have historically had their labour taken for granted, unpaid or underpaid, and their intellectual contributions stolen without acknowledgement. I hope that our field can change that now.
You are a vanguard both for the filmmakers and the audiences. Please consider at least looking into this.
I am a longtime fan of your newsletter – please understand that I am writing with respect and appreciation.
Best, Sian
Sian Evans darnsian@gmail.com darnsian@gmail.com http://www.farthestfilms.com https://www.farthestfilms.com/ Producer, Sala https://salathemovie.com/ Producer, Three Vendors of Ipanema https://threevendorsofipanema.com/ Producer, Wisdom Gone Wild https://www.pbs.org/pov/films/wisdomgonewild/

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