Three documentaries to stream: ‘Free Solo,’ ‘Folktales’ and ‘Prime Minister’
On Jan. 29, 2026, The New York Times recommends three nonfiction films to stream or rent this month: Free Solo (2018), Folktales (2025) and Prime Minister (2025), with platform details listed for each film. Free Solo, directed by Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, is an Oscar-winning documentary about Alex Honnold’s preparations to ascend El Capitan in Yosemite without ropes; Honnold succeeded in 2017, and the film notes that if he hadn’t he would be dead.
The column says the pick was made before news that Honnold had scaled a 1,667-foot skyscraper in Taipei “on Sunday.” Chin appears on camera to discuss camera placement for the climb, and the movie includes an M.R.I. in which a professor tells Honnold he has “no activation” in his amygdala; the professor adds, “Your amygdala works.
It’s just that it needs a much higher level of stimulation.” The film also examines the strain Honnold’s ambitions place on his then-new girlfriend, Sanni McCandless (now his wife). Folktales, from Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, follows three older teenagers spending a gap year at Pasvik Folk High School above the Arctic Circle in Norway, where they learn survival skills and dog sledding.
A teacher says, “This year we really hope that we can wake up your Stone Age brain.” The principal students are Hege, Bjorn Tore and Romain; the film shows instructors sending students on “solo nights” to build camps and fires accompanied by a dog while staff drop by to check on them.
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