This film is Supported By
UFO and Southern Documentary Fund

Director
Arielle Knight

Director of Photography
Fernando Rocha
Editor
Sean Weiner

Associate Producer
Alessandra Puig-Santana

The Boys & The Bees

The Boys & The Bees is shot on an idyllic farm in rural Georgia, beekeeping parents tenderly share their knowledge of life, love, and nature with their young sons while teaching them the art of beekeeping.

Dancing in the rhythm of the seasons, the film chronicles a year with the Rays and their bees. The film hums, buzzes and throbs with a terrain in flux. Landscapes shift, boys grow, bees are tended, mistakes are made, animals die, and new ones come to nest.

The film’s scope is minuscule: a boy finds the courage to tend a beehive. The film’s scope is enormous: a family uses their love of nature to restore the severed bond between Black communities and stewardship of the land.

Director: Arielle Knight @a_c_knight
Director of Photography: Fernando Rocha @brownmanwithabrownplan
Associate Producer: Alessandra Puig-Santana @alepuigsantana
Starring: Rays Family @raysdwild

Festivals

In Episode 881 of This American Life, host Ira Glass featured the short documentary The Boys and the Bees in the episode prologue.

A six-year-old boy makes an honest wish — and his father chooses to take it seriously. The result is a moving story about desire, listening, and connection.

Listen to the episode here:
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/i-want-what-i-want