The Promised Land

FULL SPOILER-FREE REVIEW @ https://fandomwire.com/the-promised-land-venice-film-festival-review-mads-mikkelsen-shines-once-again/

"The Promised Land is a profound character study of how personal ambitions and desires inevitably will fail without love, compassion, and everything else that makes us human.

Accompanied by somber cinematography and an atmospheric score, the cast delivers outstanding performances, especially Mads Mikkelsen who utilizes all his experience to drive the story with a magnetic display.

Heavy, predictable, and somewhat repetitive at times, but totally worth the ticket."

Rating: B+

Mads Mikkelsen is in his element here as the determined pioneer Ludvig Kahlen. He has been a soldier in the Danish army and has now set his heart on cultivating some salty heathland on a barren Jutland. Fortunately for him, King Frederik V is keen to see this land settled and become more productive, so he is encouraged to go and farm there. His arrival ruffles the feathers of local grandee Frederik De Schinkel (Simon Bennebjerg) who considers the land to be his, and who makes it clear that he will make life awkward for his new neighbour. Relations are not helped when he takes in a pair of runaway servants - "Ann Barbara" (Amanda Collin) and husband "Johannes" (Morten Hee Andersen) and then falls for the man's aristocratic cousin Edel Helene...

I do love me a Mads Mikkelsen movie. 'The Promised Land' is a cracker!

The two hour run time whizzes by, you can kinda guess where the (great) story is heading but at no point was that a hindrance to my enjoyment. The cinematography is splendid, as are the locations, costumes and basically every other element really. Simon Bennebjerg shows plenty of acting knack as (De) Schinkel. Others to impress are Melina Hagberg and Amanda Collin, though the whole cast produce fine displays.

Mikkelsen himself puts in a performance of quality, very much the glue that holds everything together - as one would anticipate. He suits this sorta role to the absolute tee. This is up the top of my ranking of his filmography thus far, I'd in fact only rank i...