I'm a total film dork for documentaries. I love seeing the perspectives documentary filmmakers bring to their subject matter, I love the passion with which they pursue their projects, and I love how I learn about subjects I otherwise might never think to research every time I settle down at a film fest for some rousing documentary screenings. Personally, I think most high school and college kids could learn a lot more sitting at film festivals watching the doc lineup than they learn sitting at desks being lectured to. I've learned more watching lots of docs than I did in a lot of my courses at college -- and had a lot more fun with the learning, to boot.

Fortunately for me and my dorkiness, the upcoming Sundance Film Festival has a nice slate of docs lined up for their competition lineup, so my doc lust will be sated, at least for a little while. Last year's Sundance doc lineup was a little weak -- there was lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth amongst the press there about it -- but I'm hopeful that this year's docs are going to dazzle me. There's not a whole lot of info available on most of these as of yet, but nonetheless, here are seven of the ones I'm most interested in checking out:

Banished (Director: Marco Williams) -- This film explores racial injustice and reparation through the story of three United States towns which, in the early 20th century, banished their entire African-American populations. As is so often the case with film festival docs, this one promises to be one that makes me think, "Holy geez, how could I never have heard this before?"

For the Bible Tells Me So (Director: Daniel Karslake) -- A look at how the religious right has used its interpretation of the Bible to stigmatize the gay community and erode the separation of church and state. I'm always up for a doc that delves into religious and spiritual issues; Deliver Us From Evil and Jesus Camp are two of my faves from 2006. I'll be interested to see this film's take.

Ghosts of Abu Ghraib (Director: Rory Kennedy) -- Moving on from religion to war, Ghosts of Abu Ghraib peeks at the abuses that occured at the Iraqi prison in 2003 through personal narratives with victims, perps and witnesses.

My Kid Could Paint That (Director: Amir Bar-Lev) -- Four-year-old Marla Olmstead wowed the New York art scene with paintings compared to Pollock, Kadinsky and even Picasso, and has sold $300,000 worth of paintings. Is it really art? Or is it exploitation?

Nanking (Directors: Bill Guttentag, Dan Sturman -- A look at the atrocities committed against the Chinese by the invading Japanese army during WWII's "Rape of Nanking," during which more than 200,000 Chinese were brutally murdered, and tens of thousands raped. Not likely to be one of your fun, uplifting films, but nonetheless I want to see it, as I don't know a whole lot about this subject.

Protagonist (Director: Jessica Yu) -- Straight from the hores's mouth, aka the Sundance press release announcing the doc lineup: "Protagonist explores the organic relationship between human life and Euripidean dramatic structure by weaving together the stories of four men -- a German terrorist, a bank robber, an "ex-gay" evangelist and a martial arts student." Wow. I have no idea how all those pieces are going to connect together in a meaningful and coherent way, but they had me at "Euripidean dramatic structure."

Zoo -- Last year, we told you that Police Beat director Robinson Devor had decided on his next project: A real-life story about a Seattle man who died a most unfortunate (and likely unpleasant) death after having sex with a horse. How Devor is going to explore this subject matter tastefully, I have no idea, but I'm sure as hell going to see it to find out.