It’s been 11 years since Mads Mikkelsen starred in Nikolaj Arcel’s Danish period drama A Royal Affair, one of 2012’s most raved about international films which also went on to an Oscar nomination.
Now, the countrymen are back together again with Venice competition title The Promised Land (Bastarden) which Magnolia acquired for U.S.
distribution at script stage and which is already on the shortlist to be Denmark’s Oscar submission this year. Mikkelsen plays impoverished captain Ludvig Kahlen who in 1755 sets out to conquer the harsh, uninhabitable heath of Jutland with a seemingly impossible goal: to build a colony in the name of the King.
But the merciless Frederik de Schinkel (Simon Bennebjerg) does everything in his power to drive the captain away. Kahlen will not be intimidated and engages in an unequal battle — risking not only his life, but also that of the family of outsiders that has formed around him.
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