The Promised Land is now available to stream for free on iPlayer, giving viewers a chance to catch the 2023 Danish-language war epic at no cost. Directed by Nikolaj Arcel and co-written with Anders Thomas Jensen, the film stars Mads Mikkelsen in a story built around survival, land and power.
The timing matters because the film has already built a strong reputation with critics and audiences. It holds a 97% critics’ approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 95% audience approval rating, and it was selected as Denmark’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards. It also won several accolades at the European Film Awards, strengthening its standing before it reached the platform.
Based on Ida Jessen’s 2020 book The Captain and Ann Barbara, The Promised Land follows Danish soldier and explorer Ludvig Kahlen as he works to cultivate Denmark’s wild Jutland in the mid-18th century. The cast also includes Amanda Collin and Simon Bennebjerg in the lead roles, with Kristine Kujath Thorp, Gustav Lindh, Jakob Lohmann, Morten Hee Andersen, Magnus Krepper and Felix Kramer among the supporting names. The film was shot in Germany, Sweden and Czechia, a production footprint that matches its historical scale.
That scale has also shaped the reaction to it. One reviewer said that, without a few large battle scenes, the film could sit alongside modern epics such as Braveheart. Another called it a film of epic proportions from theme to execution and said it was an absolute must-see. Viewer comments on IMDb have been just as direct, with one user calling it the best film they had seen all year and another calling it outstanding, one of the best in a long time.
What makes the free iPlayer release matter now is that the film arrives with awards recognition, strong reviews and a built-in audience that already seems convinced. For anyone who missed it in 2023, the question is no longer whether The Promised Land belongs in the conversation about recent historical dramas. It does, and it is now there for anyone to watch.
