1.) It had to be available to stream on Netflix
At the time of this writing, Netflix has over 73 million subscribers in the US and over 167 million subscribers around the world. If you factor in the number of people sharing a login, we’re pretty sure every human with a screen can access Netflix. That means no looking online for ancient VHS tapes or scouring Pirate Bay in vain hopes that someone uploaded a cult film from 1966. (Though if you really are looking for Michaelangelo Antonioni’s film Blow-Up and know how to torrent, you’re in luck!)
2.) We had to learn something
Sometimes it was about photography history. Other times it would be about composition or aesthetics. It didn’t really matter what we learned as long as it was something about photography.
Using those two rules to filter the films in the universe of photography movies, here are the 6 best photography movies you can stream on Netflix right now:
The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman's Portrait Photography (2016)
The B-Side reminded several of us of our childhood. Polaroid cameras were popular in the 80s and the film was expensive – at least, that’s what our parents said to get us to stop burning through those cartridges. This movie documents Elsa Dorfman’s passion for the 20×24 format. The history is interesting, but so are some of the photos Dorfman took with a camera most of us would find extremely limiting when compared to modern digital cameras.
Hondros (2017)
“Of all the people that do journalism, war photographers are the craziest.” That opening line from the person interviewing Chris Hondros describes this film well. If The B-Side was too tame for you, Hondros will give you your action fix. Throughout the movie, you’ll see actual footage and the pictures Chris Hondros took to capture the emotion of the moment.
We’re pretty sure that war photojournalism isn’t a sub-niche most of you are looking to get into, but this film will still help you develop an eye for capturing the essence of a memory no matter what form of photography you practice.
The Journey is the Destination (2016)
The first two photography movies we listed are more aptly labeled as documentaries. At number three, we present our first fictionalized movie…kind of.
The Journey is the Destination is the story of photojournalist Dan Eldon. Eldon seemed to be an avid writer as well as photographer. This film did a good job giving insight into Eldon’s thought process and experiences but fell short on actual photography. We were a bit divided about whether or not to include this movie in our list. Ultimately we decided that the history was interesting and we have a word count to meet, so in it goes.
Kodachrome (2018)
Kodachrome is the one “real movie” we included in our list. You’ll see big names like Ed Harris, Jason Sudeikis and Elizabeth Olsen. The story is fictional, but Kodachrome film and the pilgrimage to get that film developed at Dwayne’s Photo (the only place left that could develop the discontinued film) was real.
Despite Ed Harris’ character’s belief that, “Digital photography is like holding fake tits in your hand,” we’re still including this movie in our list. It’s a fascinating piece of history and gives some insight into what the art of photography lost with the rise of digital photography.
100 Days of Solitude (2018)
Do you love nature and landscape photography? Do you speak Spanish or love reading subtitles? If so, we’ve found your new favorite movie.
100 Days of Solitude follows Spanish photographer and documentarian Jose Diaz as he spends 100 days alone in the mountains of Northern Spain. While this photography film seems to have more videography than actual photography, the shots are well composed and are likely to inspire you to see nature and landscapes in a different way.
These Are Great, But I Wanna Binge Something
We get it. Why spend an hour and a half on a movie when you can burn an entire day bingeing an entire series. For those of you who watched all of the movies we found for you and still want more, here are a couple series worth watching.
Tales by Light
Tales by Light follows photographers in amazing locations as they capture the power, beauty or tragedy of what they see. Whether you’re into nature photography, landscape photography, action photography, or whatever photography – you’re going to love this series.
Abstract - The Art of Design
This series isn’t related to photography (except for Season 1, Episode 7), but it’s discussion on design has some implications for composition in photography. For us, it helped to see how other industries think about design and why those norms developed.
We try to keep this page as updated as possible but, sadly, we can’t always Netflix & chill to new movies. Have one of the above shows been removed from Netflix? Did you find a good one we didn’t list? Let us know!