11 documentaries to come in 2023 that you won’t want to miss

Here's our rundown of the best ones coming to TV sets, streaming and the big screen.

In The Name Of The Son

One you can watch on the small screen, In The Name Of The Son airs on RTÉ One on Thursday, March 23, at 10.15pm.

It follows Kerry mother Mags Riordan as she turns to charity and helping others in the face of grief and loss.

After losing two babies as a young mum, her son Billy also died years later at the age of 25 in a drowning accident while swimming in Lake Malawi.

A year later, Mags travelled to Malawi herself, where she was captivated by the beauty of the place and its people.

Upon seeing the devastation of Aids-related diseases on communities there, she made it her mission to open a clinic in the country, beginning by raising funds at home in Kerry and from there, it grew.

Lewis Capaldi: How I’m Feeling Now

Fans of the singer Lewis Capaldi won’t want to miss this intimate look into his life and career.

The documentary tracks the rise of Lewis from a scrappy teen with a viral performance to international pop star.

The Someone You Loved singer opens up about writing two albums, his mental health struggles, and maintaining a sense of normality and authenticity in the face of massive and sudden fame.

Netflix releases the documentary on April 5 and the single How I’m Feeling Now is available on Spotify and other music platforms now.

Pray For Our Sinners

From Break Out Pictures (An Cailín Ciúin) and director Sinéad O’Shea comes the compelling and challenging Pray For Our Sinners.

Sinéad examines the role of Catholicism in Irish life and its association with silence and repression, visiting her hometown of Navan in search of those who fought the Catholic Church and pushed back against its hold on society.

It includes previously untold testimonies from mother and baby homes, and stories from within school classrooms about corporal punishment. Pray For Our Sinners is released in Irish cinemas on April 21.

Castro’s Spies

The award-winning documentary Castro’s Spies arrives in Irish cinemas on April 28, telling the story of an elite group of Cuban intelligence agents sent undercover to the US in the 1990s.

It offers a fascinating look into the world of espionage as this gang of spies are recruited, trained and eventually captured on American soil.

The film features real FBI surveillance footage of the spies in action and a never-before-seen colour archive of the Cuban Revolution.

It also highlights the ‘Cuban Five’ trial which, to this day, is still the largest multiple defendant espionage case ever prosecuted in the US.

Forget Bond and 007 — this is the real deal.

Ed Sheeran: The Sum Of It All

Disney+ has covered artists like Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish and The Beatles in the past.

So far in 2023, the streamer has released films on U2 and Miley Cyrus. Also on the way is a four-part series with Ed Sheeran, in line with the release of his sixth album ‘-’ (Subtract).

Fulwell 73 Productions, who also produced Adele: One Night Only and Elton John Live: Farewell From Dodger Stadium, are behind the series, which includes clips from Sheeran’s personal archive, interviews with family and loved ones, and performances from the Lego House singer.

It starts streaming on May 3.

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie

Michael J. Fox has led an illustrious career and is a household name across all generations thanks to his best-known role as Marty McFly in the Back To The Future trilogy.

Just last year, he added an honorary Oscar to his many awards and accolades. Now a documentary, Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie, will trace his rise to 80s Hollywood star and diagnosis with Parkinson’s at age 29.

The film is directed by Davis Guggenheim, whose credits include An Inconvenient Truth, Waiting For “Superman”, and He Named Me Malala.

Still screened at South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival on March 14. Apple Original Films bought the rights to the project and should be streaming it later in the year.

Release date to be confirmed.

The Deepest Breath

Last December, it was announced that The Deepest Breath, a documentary from Irish director Laura McGann, was acquired by Netflix in collaboration with A24, Motive Films, Ventureland, and RAW.

It had its world premiere at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival this month and while a release date is to be confirmed, Netflix has revealed it will start streaming in 2023.

The documentary follows champion freediver Alessia Zecchini as she trains to break a world record with the help of an expert safety diver, Irishman Stephen Keenan, and the emotional bond they form.

It gives a rarely-seen insight into the freediving world and its many rewards and risks.

BTS Monuments: Beyond The Star

As well as Ed Sheeran and Lewis Capaldi, music fans can also look forward to a documentary series with K-pop’s BTS, one of the biggest bands in the world right now.

BTS Monuments: Beyond The Star will feature footage from across the band’s nine-year career and offers an intimate insight into the daily lives of its members.

It is the latest of a number of collaborations between BTS and Disney+, with such titles as BTS: Permission To Dance, In The Soop: Friendcation, and J-Hope In The Box already streaming.

Release date to be confirmed.

Our Planet II

When it comes to nature documentary series, no one narrates them like David Attenborough. Many will recall the series Our Planet from 2019.

This year, it returns for a second season and, naturally, Attenborough is back too. The show comes from the Emmy Award-winning team behind Planet Earth.

Our Planet once again features spectacular and innovative cinematography. There will be four episodes in total and it’s not the only nature series coming to Netflix in 2023.

Subscribers can also look forward to Life On Our Planet, which documents the rise and fall of Earth’s inhabitants who have been lost to the past, and is narrated by Morgan Freeman.

Yellow Door: Looking For Director Bong's Unreleased Short Film

Director Bong Joon-Ho is now known around the world as the Oscar-winning director of Parasite and one of the greats of Korean cinema.

Before that though, he began his film-making journey when he was a university student in the early 1990s. Netflix is producing a documentary which involves a quest for Bong’s unreleased first short film, Looking For Paradise, which he made during his time at uni and which just 10 people, the members of a cinephile club called Yellow Door, saw in 1992.

The documentary features meetings with the members of Yellow Door as they talk about their time in college, reminisce about the young Bong, and search for Looking For Paradise. Release date to be confirmed.

SBF And The End Of Silicon Valley

Crypto exchange FTX had such an epic rise and fall, as did its founder Sam Bankman-Fried, colloquially known as SBF, that the story was well primed for the documentary treatment.

A film collaboration between journalism outlets Vice Media and the Information called SBF And The End Of Silicon Valley is due for release in the coming months.

According to reports, director David Darg (Body Team 12, You Cannot Kill David Arquette) is also working on a documentary based on SBF and the FTX scandal, which is in collaboration with the team behind They Call Me Magic, Meet Me In The Bathroom and 76 Days.