Promised Land Director to Re-Team with Mads Mikkelsen – The Hollywood Reporter

Amanda Colleen at Magnolia Pictures’
The Promised Land, Denmark’s Oscar nomination.

Magnolia Images/Courtesy Everett Collection

Promised LandBy Danish director Nikolaj Arcel, it is a story of ambition. Set in 1755, the film centers on Captain Ludwig Kahlin (Mads Mikkelsen), a penniless former soldier determined to secure the royal title he was denied by birth – the title of the Danish film. cad, is a reference to Cahlin’s origins as the illegitimate son of a wealthy landowner and his housemaid. He aims to achieve his goal by building a colony for the Danish king in the hinterland of the meadows, which at that time was a lawless and untamed wilderness. In addition to the unforgiving climate and harsh soil that is resistant to crops, Kahlin must battle Frederik de Schinkel (Simon Benberg), a brutal and arrogant land baron determined to claim Kahlin’s land for his own.

The premise has what a classic Western is made of: the story of one man taming the frontier. But Arcel, who co-wrote the film with his frequent collaborator Anders Thomas Jensen, takes a completely different direction. Adaptation of the best-selling Danish book by Ida Jessen Captain and Anne BarbaraThey transform Kahlin’s character into a more fragile one, a man who begins to question the purpose and value of his single-minded drive.

On a limited European budget, Arcel delivered a sweeping, stunning historical epic with set pieces and wide images worthy of John Ford – the kind of big film that would be almost impossible to finance outside of tiny Denmark.

This is your first Danish film since your Hollywood debut, The Dark Tower. How does working in the European system compare?

My experience in the studio system left me a little scarred. It’s never been this much fun. I think most of the people in this movie really wanted to make something great. The problem was that everyone on this project wanted to make something different. There was this constant clash about what kind of movie it was supposed to be. In Denmark, for better or worse, it’s your film – no one really gets involved until you’re done and done with. And then if you fail, it’s on your terms. And if you succeed, it’s on your terms. It’s very different. And the United States is more… “Corporate” is probably the right word. There are a lot of people with a lot of voices. I felt like, “What am I even doing here? If my voice is just one voice out of 80 different people who have the same say as me, what am I doing here as a director?”

There was a huge difference[in making]this film, coming home, working with my friends, my old collaborators, and being in control of the film again. When you make a Danish film, no one expects it to be such a huge success, so there’s not much fear. We didn’t have to “win the year” or anything like that, which gave us more room to do the things we wanted to do.

This film is based on a novel, but the story is inspired by a real person: Captain Ludwig Kahlin, and his real-life attempts to tame the Danish prairies. How committed do you feel to actual history in the making of the film?

Very little is known about Ludwig Kallen after he went to the meadow, so there is very little information about him during the course of our film. I was adapting a work of fiction based on true events, so I was faithful to the book first and to Ida Giessen’s vision. Ludwig is real. Frederik de Schinkel is real. He was really this kind of crazy lunatic. These things are documented. But some characters are completely made up.

In many of his Danish roles, Mads Mikkelsen plays a very weak character, while in his Hollywood roles, he tends to come across as the tough, tough guy. It is rare to see him combine the two. But he does in this movie.

It was very difficult for me to write. Mads really helped me with this. Mads is a brave actor. And every time Thomas and I sat in a room together, it was Mads, in particular, who was so insistent on creating a character that was so real in terms of his psychology. We initially thought we should show him more attention. But Mads said: “No, he must be cruel and unfeeling.” He really helped me shape the character in the script. In the first half of the movie, you’re thinking: “What an idiot.” Only slowly do you understand who he is and why he does what he does. Ludwig is almost like a man who has never had feelings his entire life. And in the meadow, in this promised land, he slowly learns what passion is and what life is besides ambition and drive.

This is partly the story of a driven man who questions his ambition. Was that also your journey in making the film?

Partially, yes. But this was actually happening while I was doing it. As every parent knows, once you have a child, your entire outlook changes, and your entire life changes. I got my first film three years ago, as I was about to start writing this film. And now my second son has arrived. The big difference between making this film and any other film I’ve done is that this time I was longing to go home. Now I’m more wary of doing something that might require me to travel abroad or be away from family. I don’t want to travel far or for a long time. No matter what I do in the near future, or the distant future, I want to be close to my family. I wouldn’t have thought about that 10 years ago. Then I thought: “I am my own man, I can do what I want.” It doesn’t mean I’m any less ambitious now, but the framework within which I can make the things I want to make has changed. Now I have this framework of family and home, and anything I want to do has to fit into that.

This story first appeared in the January standalone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.