Godland - Review Thread

Godland is a movie that is very adamant about being simultaneously a Danish and Icelandic movie, to the point of having separate title cards in each language which translate somewhat differently, which I think is meant to make some sort of point about Nordic solidarity and conflict which I’m not quite sure I can tap into. The film is set in the 19th century, when Iceland was even more remote and was held as some kind of colony of Denmark and it follows a Lutheran minister from Denmark as he travels there to set up a church. He brings an old camera along with him and a title card announces at the beginning that the film was inspired by a set of photographs shot by a similar figure around that era. In keeping with that theme the film was shot on 35mm and in the Academy Ratio but with curved corners. The whole movie looks quite good and what with the setting there’s a lot of scenery to photograph here. I was pretty into it during its first half or thereabouts but it started to slowly lose me in the second half as the protagonist’s character arc takes a turn for the tortured. Honestly I’m not quite sure what the message of the whole movie is supposed to be, it starts off feeling like a movie about the hubris of what is essentially a colonizer coming in to condescendingly “save” the locals, and the movie certainly isn’t not that by the end but that doesn’t ultimately feel like the dominant theme… though I’m not exactly sure what replaces it. I don’t know, it’s certainly an interesting film that looks great and kept me interested but I’m not sure I understand the history behind or the ultimate point, maybe I’ll get more out of it if I read up on the context.