documentary
n. countablen. a film or television program that tells a true story about real people, events, or facts. It is meant to teach you something rather than just tell a made-up story.
n. a non-fictional motion picture or television program intended to document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education, or maintaining a historical record.
We watched a documentary about the history of jazz.
The filmmaker spent three years in the rainforest to complete her documentary on endangered species.
While some critics argue that every documentary inherently reflects the director's bias, the film was praised for its objective portrayal of the political crisis.
From French adjective and (hence) noun documentaire, from document, from Latin documentum. Equivalent to document + -ary.
Often takes the preposition 'on' or 'about' to indicate the subject matter.