Venice 2025: ‘The Tale of Sylian’ is One of the Best Docs of the Year
by Alex Billington
August 29, 2025
This is the story of a man and a bird. But it is also a story about a family and their farm; about a town and the people who live there; about storks and humans; about nature and men and their synergy; about how the world is changing (for the worse); about how we must reconnect with nature to heal the planet again. It is a film about how humanity is trashing this planet, ruining the world, and how we really need learn to go back and reconnect with the earth and appreciate all life on this planet again. The Tale of Sylian is the latest documentary creation by the acclaimed North Macedonian filmmaker Tamara Kotevska, following her first feature film Honeyland (which was nominated for two Oscars back in 2020). This time her focus is on a humble farmer living in a small village in the south of North Macedonia, a place which also has one of the largest white stork populations in Europe. These giant birds have established themselves as residents of this town and the locals live in harmony with them. But it is also the inspiring story of a man named Nikola who befriends a stork after his family moves away in hopes of earning more money and finding a better life.
Much like Honeyland before this, Kotevska’s The Tale of Sylian is such a spectacularly cinematic creation it’s almost completely unbelievable that it’s actually a documentary and these are all real people and this is a real story. It’s all so perfectly shot and crafted that it feels like a fictional film with actors in it giving precise performances. But that’s just not the case! Every single shot in this film is astonishing. It’s mind boggling how many perfect shots are in here. How long it must’ve taken, how many days they must’ve waited for that perfect moment, how many thousands of hours of footage they had to comb through to find that shot for this scene, how much work it was to the edit all this together into this beautiful 80 minute feature. Every shot of the storks is, and I really mean this, perfect. Whether it’s a sunset shot of them taking flight, or a silhouette of them standing in their nests above the town, or a how-did-they-get-that-zoom-shot peek at them cackling and bickering. These big carnivorous birds use their beaks to clap and create a chattering noise as their way of communicating and they’ve captured so many funny and beautiful moments of these birds doing this. I kept gasping at every new shot that appears as the story goes on. My goodness it’s so exhilarating to watch.
In addition to all these perfect shots, The Tale of Sylian is an especially moving story about a love for nature and nature’s love for us. Nikola’s relationship with a stork isn’t about their friendship, it’s about humanity’s relationship with animals, and how we appreciate and take care of each other. It’s about loving the natural world, and respecting it; and it’s about recognizing we can live in balance with nature. After establishing the characters and the story with the family, I knew something bad would happen. I knew this film would be about humans trashing earth, and indeed it is about literally this. However, unlike so many other films that show how humans are destroying this planet, there is a hopeful side to this. It’s a wholesome and heartfelt story. It takes the time to actually show us that we can return to & respect nature again. It is possible. They start growing again, they start trying again, and that’s more beautiful than simply saying it’s all bad and we need to do something and that’s it. Give me a great story about animals, and learning to return to harmony, and I will be shouting about it from the rooftops. This is one film I won’t be able to stop raving about. It’s a cinematic experience that will leave anyone who watches it changed for the better & completely rejuvenated.
Alex’s Venice 2025 Rating: 9.5 out of 10
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