, One of Europe's Last Wild Beekeepers Fights Environmental and Economic Hardships. But we decided to break that rule, said Atanas Georgiev, the films producer. This approach was followed during the post-production stages and the first six months of the rough cut, which together lasted approximately 12 months. And thats very pleasing in editing because it can become very boring seeing the same stuff again.. Honeyland received its world premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival on 28 January and it has grossed $1,315,037. [23] Austin Chronicle's Josh Kupecki said the documentary is ultimately a "broader impact of humanity (in all its messy glory), and a document of so many things: grief, loss, happiness, and joy". Hatidze generously imparts her methods to him but, pressured by money-grubbing marketeers, he disregards the half-for-them-half-for-us rule and wreaks havoc on the region's beekeeping . As the nomadic family decides to move to another village, Hatide remains alone in Bekirlija. Fejmi Daut, one of the documentary's cinematographers, said the lack of electricity in the village meant the production crew relied on daylight, candles, gaslight and a fireplace to achieve desired image quality. It won three prizes at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for best documentary and best international feature at this years Academy Awards. 2023 IndieWire Media, LLC. And that change speaks to a wider ethical conundrum that Mr. Stefanov and his colleagues have grappled with since finishing filming one that has long troubled documentary filmmakers. From the start, Georgiev said they were very aware about their responsibilities to their subjects and the eco-system -- both natural and human -- that they come from. I thought youd abandoned us.. This gave us the power of the visual story that we made. Usually you dont interfere with your protagonists but as soon as we realized Honeyland would be very successful, we thought we had to do something.. Mr. Sam wanted its water for his cows, while Ms. Muratova said it was only for human use. While translators worked to interpret the Macedonian dialect of Turkish the subjects spoke, Stefanov and Kotevska stitched a visual narrative that made sense and once the translations were added, they were surprised at what they found. It was never the main source of income for the villagers, but the families passed it down through generations. 2023 BBC. Kotevska and Stefanov's camera captures the duo's nighttime bickering with remarkable intimacy, as. "So, Hatidze's destiny was to stay and take care of her parents.". Honeyland (2019) 9 of 216. Sucked into the dispute, the crew tried to stay neutral by providing legal assistance to both parties, and they mediated an agreement by which Ms. Muratova would withdraw her complaint in exchange for Mr. Sams promise to abide by a set of principles about his future behavior. The film depicts how Ms. Muratova and Hussein Sam, a seminomadic farmer tried to coexist in one of the poorest pockets of North Macedonia. Now the filmmakers find themselves unable to leave entirely serving as mediators to, and occasionally protagonists in, the local tensions to which they once only bore witness. Hatide scolds Sam for ignoring her advice and her bee colony collapses. The documentary received numerous awards and nominations at film festivals, including three awards at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival and two nominations at the 92nd Academy Awards in the categories for Best International Feature Film and Best Documentary Feature . [22] David Ehlrich writing for IndieWire gave the film a B+ in his review, calling it "a bitter and mesmerically beautiful documentary that focuses on a single beekeeper as though our collective future hinges on the fragile relationship between her and the hives". . But there was big pressure from the public in Macedonia" for her to go to the Oscars. Critic A.O. We are now very trained to see the stories that are created visually.". [21] Each of the directors focused on a different element of the narrative; Kotevska's main role was the portrayal of relationships while Stefanov captured the environmental aspects. Directors Tamara Kotevska Ljubomir Stefanov Writers Tamara Kotevska Ljubomir Stefanov Stars Hatidze Muratova Nazife Muratova Hussein Sam Read about our approach to external linking. (Credit: Ljubo Stefanov/Trice Films) Honeyland has much to say about conserving nature, but its lessons are also about human life and relationships. In Honeyland, one of 15 feature documentaries still in contention for the Academy Awards, the indelible main character is Hatidze Muratova, a woman from a remote section of North Macedonia. One can also call it fake.". July 26, 2019 11:07 pm. I wondered why someone would agree to bare herself on camera this way. Honeyland is the first documentary to receive a nomination in both categories in the history of the Oscars. And then we started editing on mute just the visual narrative, Stefanov explained. [39] As of July 2021, Honeyland has grossed $815,082 in the US and Canada, and $499,955 in other territories, making a worldwide gross of $1,315,037. All Rights Reserved. As observers, should they ever help their subjects? We noticed you have an ad blocker on. But the similarities between people and bees do not stop there. We have no option but to cope with it somehow," said Georgiev, who also edited the film. But Hatidze was longing for her own family. Inside the house, the taps were dry, so Mr. Georgiev called the mayor to reconnect the water. [20] Josh Kupecki from the Austin Chronicle said Honeyland successfully depicts the way "capitalism functions even in the most rural areas". Honeyland opens this way: near-wordlessly, attending to the rituals of Hatidze's day, her trips to the nearest city to sell her honey. Nevertheless she still spends the bee season in her old village. Soon after, her mother dies. Hatidze Muratova, a 50-something woman, is, along with her ill mother Nazife, the last true resident of their rural village. [65] Following the movie's dual nomination, several other countries started submitting their documentaries for dual categories at the 2021 Oscar awards. Malika is the protagonist . The directors primarily focused on the visual aspects and wanted to portray humanity's balance with the ecosystem through Hatide, and consumerism and resource depletion through her neighbors. She is an incredible woman, a natural optimist. The documentary Honeyland premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, where it was the most awarded film, winning the Grand Jury Prize, Special Jury Award for Impact for Change, and the Special Jury Award for Cinematography in the World Cinema Documentary competition. What happened in the Ukraine helicopter crash? Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox. When the filmmakers first met her, she was singing, Kotevska recalled when I interviewed her and Stefanov last week. [64] Jake Coyle writing for the Associated Press deemed the documentary a "quietly revolutionary Oscar nominee" and said it "speaks to the increasingly boundless nature of [the] documentary [genre]". All pictures from Honeyland (directors: Tamara Kotevska and Ljubo Stefanov) are NEON copyright, unless otherwise stated, From World of Warcraft to conducting the Oscars, Ukrainian ministers killed in helicopter crash, Zelensky addresses world leaders after deadly helicopter crash, 15 minutes to defend yourself against death penalty. To, co zaczyna si jako serdeczne ssiedzkie stosunki, w tym Hatidze przekazuje swoj wiedz pszczelarsk Husajnowi, sprawy przybieraj obrt, gdy Hussein postanawia nie zwraca uwagi na jeden kluczowy aspekt tej wiedzy, ktry . Copyright 2023 Mother Jones and the Foundation for National Progress. "It's important who we were as people, our personalities, this was crucial. Hatidze Muratova, a 50-something woman, is . [62][34] It is also the second Macedonian film to earn an Oscar nomination after Before the Rain (1994). So all the scenes with the dialogue, particularly, we didnt know whats going on there. Informacje o filmie. ", Hatidze has travelled to Hollywood for the Oscars ceremony, and she has also been to several other film festivals, in places as far apart as New York, Switzerland, Sarajevo and Turkey. Every time she has a new person coming to her door, she starts singing to them to break the ice. She also sings to the bees, a technique that appears to quell their stings. Hatidze spends her time caring for her bees which she keeps in the stone walls of old structures and in the rocks of cliffs instead of modern bee boxes and for her mother. Just as worker bees spend their entire lives taking care of the queen bee which never leaves the hive, Hatidze has committed her own life to the care of her blind and paralyzed . Honeyland received universal critical acclaim from film critics, who praised its attention to detail and applauded its conservationist message. You can see this in our film - in both families, it doesn't make a difference what [gender] they are, they all doing the same things.". She has become a star. Read full review. by Gary Thompson Updated Aug 14, 2019 Already have an account? "Not understanding Turkish was a problem during the shooting, but we decided to let them speak as they naturally would," says Kotevska. In Hatidze's family, learning the skill skipped a generation - she learned it as a girl from her grandfather, rather than her parents. Because the crew couldn't understand the old Ottoman Turkish dialect she spoke to her mother, Georgiev did the first rough edit on mute. 7 New Netflix Shows in October 2022 -- and the Best Reasons to Watch. That was largely thanks to Mr. Stefanov and his fellow filmmakers. Hatidze lives in a village that is close to her brother relatives. Honeyland is the first film to compete for both the best documentary award and best international feature film. Then Mr. Sam wanted help with a grant application, and griped about the problem with the well. The directors focused only on the visuals without making use of audio recordings or transcripts. Its an avalanche of issues, said Julijana Daskalov, the foundations program manager. But the Honeyland directors, together with two cameramen, spent three years, on and off, visiting these families. "I think she put a spell on us all, so that we would look after her daughter when she was gone," he said. [20] She elaborated that Sam's initial hesitation to sell more honey than he could produce comes from the conflict between his moral values and "the pressures of society". One day, the Sam family, nomadic cattle farmers who speak the same archaic Turkish dialect as Haditze and her mother, install their caravan right next to the women's house. [58], Honeyland was the most awarded movie at the 2019 Sundance Movie Festival, winning awards in three categories, including the Grand Jury Prize, the Special Jury Award for Impact for Change, and the Special Jury Award for Cinematography, all in the World Cinema Documentary Competition category. It took filmmakers Tamara Kotevska and Ljubo Stefanov three years of filming in the remote countryside of Macedonia to capture the footage they used in their Sundance-winning documentary, Honeyland, about Hatidze Muratova, a rural Macedonian woman who has dedicated her life to beekeeping. We spotted Hatidze in the very beginning and just started shooting her. Ms. Muratova had lost her new house key, so the producer had to find the workman with the spare. Then there was a legal battle over an incident that predated the film, in which Ms. Muratova was attacked by Mr. Sams dogs. Hatidze Muratova, the protagonist of "Honeyland. But she refused a request to open up her hives, hidden in the crags of a nearby mountain, for fear the heat of the noon sun would harm the honeycombs. When an unruly family moves in next door, what at first seems like a balm for her solitude becomes a source of tension as they, too, want to practice beekeeping, while disregarding her advice. Meanwhile, someone had pilfered Ms. Muratovas honey, and she blamed Mr. Sam. Calm and gentle, Ms. Muratova has a deep and respectful relationship with nature, treating her bees almost as collaborators. She will be the only Turkish-Macedonian peasant in the starry audience at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. [14] Upon arriving at the location, the film crew was introduced to Hatide. Calm and gentle, Ms. Muratova has a deep and respectful relationship with nature, treating her bees almost as collaborators. Read about our approach to external linking. It's us but for your ears. Beekeeper Hatidze Muratova leads the filmmakers to the very . Sense of injustice lingers after Seoul Halloween crush, Chess gets a risqu makeover. Can you pitch in a few bucks to help fund Mother Jones' investigative journalism? Hussein, his wife and the children all share the roles around the cattle. ", "Honeyland review quietly heartbreaking meditation on rural life", "A Rare Nature Documentary That Tells a Deeply Human Story", "2019 Critics Poll: The Best Films and Performances According to Over 300 Critics From Around the World", "Best of 2019: Film Critic Top Ten Lists", " " " ", " " ": " , ", "Interview: Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov on Making the Most Out of an Environmentally Sticky Situation in "Honeyland", "The documentary 'Honeyland' captures a story of resilience", "Here Are the Winners of the 2019 Sundance Awards", " , - 2020", "How 'Honeyland' Became an Oscar Game Changer", "Making Oscar history, 'Honeyland' shatters borders", "Post 'Honeyland,' More Countries Are Submitting Documentary Oscar Contenders", "Oscar nominations 2020: 'Joker' leads with 11; Greta Gerwig snubbed for best director; complete list of nominees", "2019 EDA Award Winners Alliance of Women Film Journalists", "The 2019 Boston Society Of Film Critics (BSFC) Winners", "Chicago Film Critics Give Best Picture To 'Parasite' And Best Director To Bong Joon Ho", "American Factory and Apollo 11 Top 2020 Cinema Eye Honors", "The 2019 Dallas Fort-Worth Film Critics Association (DFWFCA) Winners", "DGA Announces Nominees for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Theatrical Feature Film for 2019", "HONEYLAND won Best International Film Award at the 21st edition of DOCAVIV The Tel Aviv International Documentary Film Festival", "2019 European Film Awards: Nominees and Favorites", "The Lighthouse, Uncut Gems Lead 2020 Indie Spirit Nominations", "New York Film Critics Circle Names 'The Irishman' Best Film; Safdie Brothers, Lupita Nyong'o, Antonio Banderas Among Winners", "The Online Film Critics Society (OFCS) Announces 2019 Award Winners", "PGA Awards Documentary Nominations: 'Apollo 11', 'American Factory', 'The Cave', 'Honeyland', Others Make The Cut", "International Press Academy (IPA) Satellite Awards: 'Ford v Ferrari' races to the top with 5 wins", "The 2019 Seattle Film Critics Society (SFCS) Nominations", "The 2019 St. Louis Film Critics Association (StLFCA) Nominations", "2019 Suundance Film Festival Awards Announced", "Parasite Finds a Host in D.C. Film Critics Awards 2019", "Honeyland: Why you need to see this beautifully crafted and compelling human drama", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Honeyland&oldid=1125146488, Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography in Documentary, Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography, Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking, Atanas Georgiev & Tamara Kotevska & Ljubomir Stefanov, Tamara Kotevska & Ljubomir Stefanov & Atanas Georgiev, World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary, World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Impact for Change, World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematography, This page was last edited on 2 December 2022, at 12:21. Sundance 2023: Slashed Streaming Budgets and Theatrical Woes Won't Dampen Sales This is the first of many surprises in Honeyland (2019), a documentary set in a rugged, barely inhabited region of Macedonia where an extraordinary woman named Hatidze maintains ancient traditions of wild beekeeping. Hatidze lives with her ailing mother in the mountains of Macedonia, making a living cultivating honey using ancient beekeeping traditions. She lives with her mother and is her care-taker, although . Directors Filming of Honeyland lasted three years, and 400 hours of footage was filmed. We began Honeyland in the framework of a nature conservation project. Georgiev realised they had something way beyond a morality tale about capitalism on their hands. "honeyland," directed by tamara kotevska and ljubomir stefanov, is set in macedonia and follows the life of the region's last nomadic beekeeper hatide muratova, much of the film tracks the. Having lived 56 years quite happily without television, Hatidze wasn't all that aware of "Sex and the City", although she graciously told the star-struck actress's fortune "by reading the coffee grains in bottom of her cup.". . [34][35] The documentary includes numerous scenes of Hatide and her neighbors during the beekeeping process, including the handling of the apiaries where the bees are kept, the cutting of honeycombs and the collection of honey in jars. In one scene of the film, Hatidze asks her mother why she turned down offers of marriage that were brought for Hatidze. In a deserted Macedonian village, Hatidze, a 50-something woman, trudges up a hillside to check her bee colonies nestled in the rocks. Hatidze Muratova, the subject of the award-winning documentary 'Honeyland.' Neon A woman walks down a dusty, sunbaked road. The arrival of a nomadic familytrailer, shabby cattle, kittens, and a litter of children in towshatters Hatidzes serene world, and that tension sets the dramatic stakes of the film. "Marriage . The HONEYLAND story began long before humans ever lived in the region, but our narrative starts with its last two remaining inhabitants: Hatidze and her mother Nazife. Self: Honeyland. The project originally started as an environmental documentary about the river running through the center of Macedonia, but plans changed when the team discovered the beehives Hatidze tended in remote areas. Hatidze Muratova in Honeyland (2019) Close. We were tasked to produce a short documentary about the area, built around an environmental topic. She has become a star. Scott, the co-chief film critic of The New York Times, named it the No. . [47] Ed Potton of The Times, who gave the film four stars out of five, said "[a]lthough it starts as a meditation on the hardship and rhythms of rural life, [the film] becomes something more intimate". Film Crew Spent 3 Years in Remote Balkan Hamlet. She is one of the last keepers of wild bees in Europe. This was the most powerful sentence," he said. Mr. Georgiev and Ms. Muratova visiting her new house in Dorfulija, which is still under construction. It is well known that male and female bees fill very different roles, but the film shows everybody doing the same jobs. He takes all the honey from his own hives, but his bees respond to this by attacking Hatidze's hives, leading to their destruction, and a conflict between the human neighbours. happened upon a pivotal conflict that would alter Hatidze's life: the arrival of a nomadic family of nine who settled nearby with a few hundred cattle and a fierce determination to make a living. At Spains request, the European Court of Justice excluded Kosovo from participating in the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC), the Court of Justice of the European Union informed. Who was Ukrainian minister Denys Monastyrsky? Hatide instructs him on collecting honey and provides him with several bees so Sam can start his own colony. "We were doing it by instinct, and then as soon as we got the translations the plot was all there. Given her exceptionally poor living conditions in the nearly deserted hamlet of Bekirlija, Hatidze would often say that her main wish, out of her newfound fame, is to move to a better house in the near-by village of Dorfulija which offers far better living standards. Honeyland began as a government-funded environmental short exploring conservation, biodiversity . France 24 - International breaking news, top stories and headlines. And by all accounts, she is quite happy, according to filmmakers Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov. "Hatidze acts with the bees as if they were her family and she takes care of them as if they were her children," says Kotevska. " " Unofficial audio for Hatidze's song "Cekor Po Cekor" SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE . While working on a short video commissioned by a nature conservancy project, the filmmakers met Hatidze Muratova, a middle-aged woman who ekes out a hardscrabble and solitary existence harvesting honey with ancient, sustainable methods across the craggy mountainous landscape of the former Yugoslav republic while caring for her half-blind and bedridden mother in a modest home without . But when they met Hatidze a beekeeper who returned half of her honey to the bees who made it, and lived in an abandoned village caring for her ailing, blind mother - they found a dynamic. Hatidze, star of the Oscar nominated Honeyland movie, gets a new house. But she wasnt shy, and eventually allowed Kotevska and Stefanov to film her. BELGRADE, Serbia After taking the lead role in Oscar-nominated documentary Honeyland, Hatice (Atidze) Muratova left behind her previous life of poverty. He elaborated, "a sensitivity to both petty human concerns and striking natural beauty is what makes Honeyland a particularly enthralling documentary. Women Talking and Emancipation Cinematographers on Why They Desaturated Their Oscar Contenders, When in Doubt, Cut to Margot: Editing the 30-Minute Opening Bacchanal of Babylon, Everything Is Based on Something Real: Cinematographer Russell Carpenter on Shooting Avatar: The Way of Water, The 50 Best Movies of 2022, According to 165 Critics from Around the World, All 81 Titles Unceremoniously Removed from HBO Max (So Far), 10 Shows Canceled but Not Forgotten in 2022. When Hatidze went for a dress fitting for the Oscars in the North Macedonian capital Skopje, it took "20 minutes for her to walk 200 metres because so many people wanted to have a selfie with her,"" Georgiev revealed. Hatidze Muratova Nazife Muratova Hussein Sam Ljutvie Sam . But Kotevska says that there was never any need for negotiation; from the first time she encountered the filmmakers, Hatidze wanted to get her story out to the world. A woman walks alone through the untamed mountains and hills of Macedonia. Honeyland is the story of Hatidze, a lone rural beekeeper in the spectacular, almost unpopulated Macedonian mountain countryside. They have since helped set Hatidze up in a new winter home close to her relatives in the "nearest village to civilisation". [15] The film was going to focus on Hatide's relationship with her mother and the directors had no conflict planned until the nomad family arrived sometime later. At its heart, this film is a character study, a meditation on the life of a woman who has carved out a precarious existence in an unforgiving place. Listen on Apple Podcasts. This is exemplified when she chants "half for me, half for you" to her bees when collecting honey. Honeyland. Hatidze Muratova, the star of the documentary Honeyland, was given a new house by the producers of the double Oscar nominated movie. That scene where she's taking the honey, she's saying, "Half for me and half for you." That was . In the film, relations between Ms. Muratova and Mr. Sam were bad; Mr. Sam ignored Ms. Muratovas advice about how to start his own bee colony, leading his bees to attack hers and ruining Ms. Muratovas entire livelihood. A.O. Nell Minow: Directors Ljubo Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska show the same infinite patience and care in telling the story of their subject, a Macedonian beekeeper named Hatidze, that Hatidze shows in caring for her bees. Honeyland has a strong ecological message, but it's the life story of the woman at the centre of the film that has struck a chord around the world. [39], On 22 October 2019, Honeyland was released in the US on video on demand and DVD by Universal Studios. Honeyland chronicles a period of Hatidze's life when her ancient methods of beekeeping came up against, and conflicted with, those of a newcomer to her remote home region. They also planned to follow the natural change of the river's flow that takes place every ten years. So she was very happy to participate in this. She hikes along a mountain ridge, prying a small, flat slab from the. When the rules are broken, everyone pays the price. She says nothing to the camera as she heads to a cliffside spot with no signs -- the directions are known only to her.