Honeyland

Set in a faraway corner of the Balkan Peninsula, this documentary is an unforgettable character study and a close look at an endangered tradition. That tradition is wild beekeeping, or bee hunting, and the film’s central character is said to be the only woman in Europe still carrying on the practice in the old-school way — which is to say, in harmony with the insects. Shot over a three-year period, the film began as a commissioned video for an environmental project and found its heart in Hatidze Muratova, who trusted in the directors and let them into her life.

Directors: Tamara Kotevska, Ljubomir Stefanov

The Platform

An accidentally perfect parable for current times, “The Platform” has an ingeniously simple premise: Goreng wakes up in a concrete room. In the center of the floor and ceiling are large, rectangular holes, through which he can see other identical rooms stretching above and below across innumerable stories. Each room contains two people. Every day, a platform covered in food is presented to Floor 1. Once Floor 1’s inhabitants have eaten their fill, the platform is lowered to Floor 2. They eat their fill, and the platform is lowered again, and so on. Each floor can only eat what the floor above leaves. Greed and selfishness are rife, but Goreng hopes that he can change that, one way or another.

Director: Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia

A Sun

This film follows a troubled family of four. A-Ho, the younger son, has always been a problematic child, and his father, A-Wen has invested all his hopes and expectations in his introverted eldest son A-Hao. While A-Hao is trying to get into medical school, A-Ho faces juvenile detention for a crime committed with his best friend. Not long after A-Ho is sent to prison, his girlfriend shows up on his mother Qin’s doorstep. The teenage girl is pregnant and determined to have A-Ho’s child, even though he is locked up and has no idea she is expecting.

Director: Chung Mong-Hong