Shooting started in 2016 within the Nature Conservation project in Macedonia, that is supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. In the beginning the project was meant to be a small exploration about the nature in the region, but later it developed into a narrative long documentary.

Honeyland follows 50-year-old Atidze, the last female bee hunter in the Balkans (who lives in an abandoned village without roads and electricity with her blind, paralysed mother) in her struggle to save her bees from bees kept by a family of nomadic beekeepers, that start attacking them because of food deficiency.

If Atidze doesn’t manage to save the bees, she might leave forever. Her only hope is to convince the newcomers to follow the rule of beekeeping that she has been following her whole life: “Always leave half of the honey to the bees that made it”.

Honeyland is produced by Atanas Georgiev and Ljubo Stefanov through Trice Films and Apollo Media.

Approximately 80% of the film has already been shot and two more shooting weeks before the last honey season in autumn are planned, with the possibility of one extra shooting week afterwards. The documentary should be finished by May 2018.

Rights are currently available for the whole world, except for Macedonia.

Production Information:

Trice Films
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Credits:

Directors: Ljubo Stefanov, Tamara Kotevska
Scriptwriters: Ljubo Stefanov, Tamara Kotevska
DoPs: Fejmi Daut, Samir Ljuma