Dispatches From VIFF #3

The Promised Land, The Royal Hotel, The Settlers, The Wait

The Promised Land

Dutch cinema of the last two decades has become a fantastic corner of the film landscape. Not to say they didn’t make great films before, but before then they didn’t have one of the greatest living actors turning in wonderful, heart-stopping performances every year or two. With The Promised Land, Mads Mikkelson yet again absolutely captures the camera as a former soldier who attempts to become a farmer in the inhospitable northern Dutch lands, the Jutlands. Through intense hardships, both natural and man-made, Mikkelson’s Ludvig von Kahlen is staunch in his attitude, unbendable in his ways, even when it breaks his heart to stand by his beliefs. Mikkelson is joined by a stunning cast of characters, from the friendly preacher who assists him in his journey, to the housemaid with a determination as stern as Kahlen’s, to his political rival, the childish and impertinent Johannes Eriksen.

With these characters, the story of survival and strength at all costs comes to life. The period piece production design is wonderful, and the vistas, from the barren wastelands of the Jutland to the glorious extravagance of the Eriksen palace, build a world that the audience is easily drawn into. The story is not one of surprise, or of twists and turns, but a great story told impeccably well is still a well-won accomplishment. A tale of the rot that comes with greed, and the power needed to forego that powerful entity.

The Royal Hotel

In 2019 director Kitty Green wowed me with her feature debut The Assisstant. Four years later we finally receive her follow-up, The Royal Hotel, a film that covers familiar ground as her previous work, while expanding the canvas in which she uses. In The Assistant, the film is almost entirely composed of close-up, claustrophobic shots of actress Jennifer Garner as she discovers the disturbing culture that is hidden under the surface of her office job. In The Royal Hotel, the office is replaced by the desolate Australian outback, her office space replaced by an aged and decrepit pub. Still, the themes of the horrors of the unsaid and the underlying tension that women sense when in a male-dominated space are at the forefront of each film.

Unfortunately, the expanded canvas doesn’t help paint a better story in this case. The film falls victim to repetitiveness, with the threats perceived by our protagonist outlined clearly from the beginning, and only ramping up moderately from there. There is fear here, there are threats of violence, both spoken and unspoken, and yet the film is never able to capitalize on the tension these threats present. Garner does well in her role, but the beats feel rather one note from the onset and are never handled in a particularly interesting way. A film that makes its points blatantly and without much nuance, while never being offensively on the nose, never seems to have a deeper sense of it’s self. A step down from Green’s previous work, but not an outright dud.

The Settlers

Some films you need to sit with for your thoughts to truly come to pass. With The Settlers, we follow three men (A Scot, an American, and a native Chilean) as they cross the plains of the country in order to better fence off the land the government has set aside for a local baron. The expedition sometimes breaks into moments of intense violence, as the colonization of the country involves the displacement and genocide of the Native population. The beatific landscapes of the countryside are thus wounded and tarnished by the blood spilled by our companions, and by the government in general. For me, it is only in the final line of the film (that I won’t give away here) that the film truly galvanizes its vision.

At times loose in its storytelling, the film ends on such a powerful note that it’s one that will be hard to forget. Engaging with ideas of the humiliation that comes with colonization and the pathetic men that lead these efforts of genocide, the film at times comes across as unfocused. The brutality of the violence sharpens this focus but the spaces between these can be meandering and uncompelling. Not that the film should solely focus on the violence, but the characters we’re following are not the deepest wells to draw from, and while the performers do well with the material they are given, only have a few moments where they are allowed to truly shine. A film that the third act (a complete tonal shift from the first two) that is so wonderfully done that you somewhat wish it was a short instead of a feature, but still one well worth your time.

The Wait

I love horror films, especially horror films that transcend across multiple genres. With The Wait, we follow a young family (father, mother, son) as they take a caregiver job at a remote mountain estate. While this may remind some of the classic The Shining, the film’s influences are much closer to dreary, dread-filled Westerns such as Unforgiven and The Wild Bunch. When tragedy strikes the family, the film begins its slow descent into madness, and nothing is as it appears on this estate.

A unique vision at times and a cliche at others, the film shows sparks of inspiration in between the at times tedious visions of horror. It uses some amazing extreme close-ups that truly sell some horrific moments but tends to spin its wheels throughout the majority of its run time. Repetitive to the point of boredom, the filmmaker isn’t able to truly connect his scenes to any grander thematic oeuvre, and when he attempts to connect all the threads at the end it comes out as half-baked and underwhelming. There is promise in the direction, but the story left much to be desired.