THE PROMISED LAND (2023)

Are you comforted by a faith in order, manmade or otherwise? Or do you see the chaos, with its fortune and fortitude at play as we plan, react and fumble with survival, and where success has no definition? For those in The Promised Land, an historical drama set on the once barren 18th century Jutland moorland, order and chaos are to be exploited, and the consequences are all one can look back on. Mads Mikkelsen lives this truth as Captain Ludvig Kahlen, a Danish officer of questionable birth who takes it upon himself to use his meagre pension from 25 years of service in the German Army to do the impossible, have a successful harvest, settle the desolate territory, and in return receive a noble title. It’s a lofty aspiration and all bets and forces are against him, except they are not, as he perseveres. Mikkelsen is all of us as he vies to reap what he sows, and we can only watch as he eats the means and drawbacks in a pursuit for his own recognition. What that ultimately means is a matter of perspective. Or what some might call faith.

WATCH OR NOT: WATCH

Additional musings: Like all good westerns, its purity is terrifying, and when done to this calibre, it devastates (and comforts?) us with its clear-eyed refection of life, it’s dreams and hindsight.