A little film from North Macedonia is one step closer to making Oscar history. Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stefanov’s Honeyland made the Oscars 2020 shortlists for both International Feature Film (formerly known as Foreign Language Film) and Documentary Feature. If Honeyland clears the next hurdle and scores nominations in both categories, it will be the first film in Oscar history to nail this combination. Fifteen films made this year’s documentary cut, including Apollo 11, The Biggest Little Farm, For Sama, and Maiden. The International Feature Film race narrowed to ten, with Parasite, Pain and Glory, Beanpole, and The Painted Bird all advancing.

Honeyland, a documentary about a very special beekeeper

Kotevska and Stefanov’s fly-on-the-wall documentary follows Hatidze Muratova, the only remaining female wild beekeeper in Europe. Living in an abandoned village in the mountains of Macedonia with her elderly, bedridden mother, Hatidze makes a modest living off the honey she harvests from beekeeping, a profession that has been in her family for generations. One day, without warning, Hatidze’s routine and solitary existence are upended when the Hussein family moves in next door. At first skeptical, she slowly warms to the Hussein clan. She goes as far as sharing with them tricks of her trade. However, the family has their priorities and is scrambling to make ends meet. Eventually, tensions arise.

Honeyland is so intimate and heart-breaking that it could be mistaken for fiction, which is a testament to the filmmakers who spent three years with the subject. Hatidze is naïve and too trusting of her exploitative neighbors. The film becomes an allegory for many of Western civilization’s ills, including climate change, colonialism, and industrialization.

Kotevska and Stefanov’s film dominated this year’s festival circuit. Its journey began at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, where it walked off with three prizes, World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary; World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Impact for Change; and World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematography. The doc’s New York premiere came in April when it screened at New Directors/New Films 2019.

Oscar Documentary Feature and International Feature Film shortlists cross-over

As for the Oscars, thanks to new Academy rules, it is easier for foreign-language films to qualify for the documentary award. If a country submits a documentary as its international feature entry, the film will automatically be considered for both the Documentary Feature and International Feature Film prizes. This year, seven films, including Honeyland, were eligible for both categories. Among them Anastasiya Miroshnichenko’s Debut (Belarus), Marianna Economou’s When Tomatoes Met Wagner (Greece), Kourosh Ataee and Azadeh Moussavi’s Finding Farideh (Iran), Garry Keane and Andrew McConnell’s Gaza (Ireland), Kristine Briede and Audrius Stonys’ Bridges of Time (Lithuania), and Dian Lee and Ineza Roussille’s M for Malaysia. Of this group, Honeyland is the sole film to advance in either category.

In the history of the awards, there is only one other film that the Academy shortlisted in both the foreign-language and documentary feature categories, Wim Wenders’ Pina (2011). Wenders’ documentary about the late German choreographer, Pina Bausch, received a Best Documentary Feature nomination but was shut out of foreign language. We won’t know the fate of Honeyland until Monday, January 13, 2020, when the Academy announces the nominees for Oscars 2020. Also, we can’t count Honeyland out of getting noms in other categories such as Best Picture or Cinematography.

How to watch Honeyland

If you haven’t seen Kotevska and Stefanov’s documentary, it is best viewed in a theater. The cinematography is stunning, and there are several scenes shot in low-light conditions. For those in New York, the Museum of Modern Art is hosting a screening on December 29 as part of The Contenders 2019. And, the Museum of the Moving Image included Honeyland in its Curators’ Choice 2019 series. The film screens on Saturday, January 4. Tickets for these screenings are available here and here. Honeyland is a NEON release. UPDATE 1/3/20: AMC Theatres and IFC Center are screening all the shortlisted documentaries at the beginning of January. For screening information, visit the AMC Theatres website and the IFC Center website. UPDATE 1/17/20: Honeyland is back in theaters. Visit the film’s website for showtimes.

If you prefer to watch it at home, Honeyland is available for purchase on DVD or digital. You can also watch it On Demand. UPDATE 1/13/20: Honeyland is now streaming on Hulu.

For a complete list of films that made the 92nd Annual Oscars International Feature Film and Documentary Feature shortlists see below.

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
“Advocate”
“American Factory”
“The Apollo”
“Apollo 11”
“Aquarela”
“The Biggest Little Farm”
“The Cave”
“The Edge of Democracy”
“For Sama”
“The Great Hack”
“Honeyland”
“Knock Down the House”
“Maiden”
“Midnight Family”
“One Child Nation”

INTERNATIONAL FEATURE FILM
Czech Republic, “The Painted Bird”
Estonia, “Truth and Justice”
France, “Les Misérables”
Hungary, “Those Who Remained”
North Macedonia, “Honeyland”
Poland, “Corpus Christi”
Russia, “Beanpole”
Senegal, “Atlantics”
South Korea, “Parasite”
Spain, “Pain and Glory”