This latest selection of the year’s best short documentaries from The New York Times’ award-winning series is the fifth edition of a treasured Doc Stories tradition. This year’s program highlights people in search of something, from an amateur storm chaser on a quest for a tornado, to a fencer trying to overcome tragedy, to the head of a surrogacy agency seeking someone to bear her child.

My American Surrogate
(Leslie Tai, USA 2019, 24 min)
A Chinese businesswoman in California has become a matchmaker between Chinese parents and American wombs.