Yet slowly, he begins to form an emotional connection with the prisoners due to their young age, despite having a large prejudice against the German people. Carl Rasmussen (Roland Møller), who is in charge of the POW unit. The film mostly explores the moral dilemma faced by Sgt. The film deliberately casts the prisoners as teenage soldiers who were conscripted into the war against their will and do not harbor the hate and resentment that their country’s regime was known for. Still, it is not meant to illicit sympathy for the Germans, but rather to wipe away the historical barriers that divide nations and focus more on humanizing the soldiers on an individual level. The film, which was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2017 Academy Awards, is unique in that it flips the traditional narrative of World War II films by not casting the Germans as the villains, but rather as the protagonists of the story.
The Danish film, directed by Martin Zandvliet, takes place immediately after the end of World War II and follows a small group of young, German prisoners of war who are not allowed to go home until they have cleared the Danish coastline of German landmines.
In a film landscape awash with stale period pieces and war dramas, “Land of Mine” is a unique foreign picture that injects some life into the genre by bending the perceptions of war narratives while simultaneously being an emotional powerhouse. Roland Møller stars in the Danish war film, “Land of Mine,” which will hit theaters on Friday.