BEKIRLIJA, North Macedonia — When the producer and two administrators of “Honeyland” returned to the setting of their documentary in North Macedonia for the primary time because it earned two Oscar nominations in February, one thing elementary had modified.
The movie chronicles the tensions between Hatidze Muratova, an area beekeeper, and a farmer in the distant hamlet of Bekirlija. Squeezed between two rocky hills and circled by imperial eagles, the village was nonetheless reachable solely in an off-road automobile, by way of a steep, rutted observe. Most of the homes have been nonetheless in ruins, slowly sliding into the undergrowth.
And Hatidze Muratova, one of many hamlet’s final inhabitants and the star of “Honeyland,” was nonetheless ready for the filmmakers with a smile and a robust espresso.
But Ms. Muratova’s cramped, darkish lounge, web site of the film’s most transferring scene, not felt lived in.
“Now this place and these people are different,” mentioned a wistful Ljubomir Stefanov, one of many movie’s two co-directors, sitting in Ms. Muratova’s backyard. “And I can feel that she feels that this is not her only home.”
That was largely due to Mr. Stefanov and his fellow filmmakers. Using prize cash received by the movie, he and his colleagues had discovered her a brand new home in Dorfulija, a bigger and wealthier village about half an hour’s drive away. She now divides her time between the 2 villages.
And that change speaks to a wider moral conundrum that Mr. Stefanov and his colleagues have grappled with since ending filming — one which has(*3*). As observers, ought to they ever assist their topics? And as people, how might they ever not?
Some documentary crews preserve an expert distance even after filming stops.
“But we decided to break that rule,” mentioned Atanas Georgiev, the movie’s producer.
The movie depicts how Ms. Muratova and Hussein Sam, a seminomadic farmer tried to coexist in one of many poorest pockets of North Macedonia.
At the time of filming, Ms. Muratova lived year-round in Bekirlija, whereas Mr. Sam’s chaotic household normally solely visited throughout the summer season, disrupting Ms. Muratova’s quiet existence.
The movie was shot on a shoestring funds, however grossed a little bit over $1 million, and turned its makers into darlings of the documentary circuit. It additionally made Ms. Muratova maybe the world’s most well-known beekeeper.
It received three prizes on the prestigious Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for finest documentary and finest worldwide function at this yr’s Academy Awards. A.O. Scott, the co-chief movie critic of The New York Times, named it the No. 1 movie of 2019.
In a less complicated world, Mr. Georgiev, Mr. Stefanov and his co-director, Tamara Kotevska, could be basking in their newfound success, and specializing in new initiatives.
But the “Honeyland” administrators, along with two cameramen, spent three years, on and off, visiting these households.
That intense course of in the end shoved Ms. Muratova and Mr. Sam, susceptible individuals who had by no means beforehand even been to a cinema, into the media glare. And the complexities of this transition created a conflict between the filmmakers’ skilled duties as cleareyed observers and their topics’ emotional expectations of them as people and pals.
Now the filmmakers discover themselves unable to depart completely — serving as mediators to, and sometimes protagonists in, the native tensions to which they as soon as solely bore witness.
“For the film crew,” mentioned Ms. Muratova, “it was more demanding to deal with us after the film than during the filming itself.”
Both members of North Macedonia’s Turkish minority, Ms. Muratova, 56, and Mr. Sam, 70, have related roots in rural poverty, however markedly completely different approaches to life.
Calm and delicate, Ms. Muratova has a deep and respectful relationship with nature, treating her bees virtually as collaborators. Mr. Sam has a extra haphazard approach together with his cows, viewing them virtually as antagonists.
Ms. Muratova by no means married, whereas Mr. Sam and his spouse, Ljutvie, have eight rambunctious kids.
In the movie, relations between Ms. Muratova and Mr. Sam have been unhealthy; Mr. Sam ignored Ms. Muratova’s recommendation about the best way to begin his personal bee colony, main his bees to assault hers and ruining Ms. Muratova’s complete livelihood.
But in relative phrases, the interval depicted in the movie proved to be a uncommon interval of calm in a battle that had begun lengthy earlier than filming began, and which has escalated because it completed. During postproduction, the 2 grew to become locked in a dispute a few communal effectively in Bekirlija. Mr. Sam needed its water for his cows, whereas Ms. Muratova mentioned it was just for human use.
Then there was a authorized battle over an incident that predated the movie, in which Ms. Muratova was attacked by Mr. Sam’s canine.
Sucked into the dispute, the crew tried to remain impartial by offering authorized help to each events, and so they mediated an settlement by which Ms. Muratova would withdraw her criticism in trade for Mr. Sam’s promise to abide by a set of rules about his future habits.
To reduce the stress on himself in refereeing the connection, Mr. Georgiev created a basis that works with the households independently of the crew. A volunteer social employee now helps each households overcome a unending checklist of logistical and social challenges, together with organising financial institution accounts and enrolling them in social safety.
“It’s an avalanche” of points, mentioned Julijana Daskalov, the inspiration’s program supervisor.
Even with this assist, Mr. Georgiev remains to be typically drawn into the disputes. When he and the 2 administrators visited in July, they have been instantly overwhelmed by a brand new barrage of points.
Ms. Muratova had misplaced her new home key, so the producer needed to discover the workman with the spare. Inside the home, the faucets have been dry, so Mr. Georgiev known as the mayor to reconnect the water. Then Mr. Sam needed assist with a grant software, and griped about the issue with the effectively. Meanwhile, somebody had pilfered Ms. Muratova’s honey, and she or he blamed Mr. Sam.
“It’s impossible!” sighed Mr. Georgiev. “We are filmmakers, not social workers.”
Intervening is usually thankless anyway.
Moments earlier than leaving, Mr. Sam pulled him apart to ask why he hadn’t been in contact a lot throughout the coronavirus lockdown.
“You haven’t been calling,” Mr. Sam mentioned. “I thought you’d abandoned us.”
Yet Mr. Georgiev has been something however absent. In reality, the social employee felt he had made himself too accessible. In addition to discovering Ms. Muratova a brand new home, he and his crew purchased Mr. Sam a brand new truck and glued his household’s chimney.
This sort of involvement is partly a self-interested act, Mr. Georgiev mentioned — a way of each salving the crew’s conscience for deriving skilled profit from the lives of each Mr. Sam and Ms. Muratova, and keeping off public criticism.
But additionally it is “kind of a payback,” Mr. Georgiev mentioned. “Usually you don’t interfere with your protagonists — but as soon as we realized ‘Honeyland’ would be very successful, we thought we had to do something.”
Still, the transformation of Ms. Muratova’s life isn’t essentially one thing to mourn, Mr. Stefanov mentioned.
“Life is not an infinite process — it has phases,” he mentioned. “And this is her wish.”
And even together with her newfound fame, Ms. Muratova mentioned she nonetheless remained true to her vocation. At her outdated dwelling in Bekirlija, she proudly unveiled her newest bowl of liquid honey. But she refused a request to open up her hives, hidden in the crags of a close-by mountain, for concern the warmth of the midday solar would hurt the honeycombs.
“Even if I’m in a film,” she mentioned, “I’m still going to take care of my bees.”
