Rent The Promised Land (2023)

Very Watchable and Fascinating Danish film Set in 1755 - The Promised Land review by PV

This is not as good as ROYAL AFFAIR by the same director, also with the superb Mads Mikkelsen who makes any film (The Hunt) or TV series (Hannibal) watchable!

This is from a novel and I suppose it shows. Many authors now are keen (overly so perhaps) to include ethnic characters and show women being strong & independent, and this ticks those boxes. The Roma girl is great however and reveals the superstitions of country people all over Europe then.

It also has the biggest pantomime villain I have seen on screen since Alan Rickman in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves. I mean really he could play the baddie in panto all Christmas long on the basis of his behaviour here! JUST this side of a cartoon character, but it's close!

It is fascinating as a story, set in 1755, based on truth apparently. The heath does not look like the heath I grew up near which was all gorse and broom and hawthorn trees, sometimes birch. The soil was sandy from an ancient shallow tropical sea, hence no farming interest. This is more heather moorland as in Scotland.

It is somewhat slow as a film, but intelligent.

4 stars

The Promised Land - The Promised Land review by JR

A slow start but somehow it held interest. A compelling story, well told. Exploration of unchecked sadism and inhumanity, prejudice, ambition, shady politics and hard work. Some gentle humour and moral questions too. All set in a harshly beautiful landscape.

Tough Nut (spoiler) - The Promised Land review by Steve

Delirious period melodrama set in 18th Century Jutland. A brief internet search suggests there isn't much real history here, and is adapted from a novel closer to Catherine Cookson than Hilary Mantel. Other than the superior set design and luminous widescreen photography it might suit Sunday evening tv more than a cinema release.

This is a time of heartbreaking rural feudalism. Mads Mikkelsen plays a low born soldier who applies to the King for land on the barren heathland of the Jutland Peninsular where he plans to grow the humble potato. Through formidable perseverance he clears the land but faces even greater hardship from the vicious, idiotic bandits...

More infuriating resistance comes from the most feckless, decadent - and psychopathic- aristocrat in fiction, in a portrayal from Simon Bennebjerg which must have been inspired by Tod Slaughter. Well, this is melodrama! With the support of a pair of selfless women usefully enamoured of the dour farmer, he ultimately prevails...

Which is ideal, as everyone gets what they deserve, which is all we really ask. There is a tiresome plot strand with a 'cursed' little girl which goes nowhere. But we get a lavish, epic production and aside from the extreme events, an impression of the incredible hardship endured by pioneers to prepare the land for their apathetic descendants!