An unnamed reporter from Denmark earned laughter when he asked actor Mads Mikkelsen and Danish filmmaker Nikolaj Arcel about the lack of diversity in their new movie, “The Promised Land.”

(Video Credit: Fox News)

The film takes place in Denmark in the 1750s when diversity was not an issue that was bandied about. The reporter asked the question during a Venice Film Festival press conference.

“This is a cast and Danish production that is entirely Nordic, therefore has some lack of diversity, you would say, there’s also new rules implied in Hollywood,” the reporter posited to the actor and filmmaker.

Mikkelsen cut the reporter off at the knees while shaking his head in disbelief that the question even came up.

It baffles my mind that that question would even be contemplated…

— Ray Nelson (@Ray_Of_Laughter) September 8, 2023

“What? From the get-go,” Mikkelsen answered while laughing.

The reporter pointed out that there are now “rules of diversity across the Atlantic.” He told them that the Academy Awards have representation and inclusion standards for Oscars eligibility in the Best Picture category as if that had anything to do with the period piece.

“Are you worried about that?” the reporter asked Mikkelson.

The actor, who is fresh off starring in the latest “Indiana Jones” film, epically clapped back, “Are you?”

The reporter alluded to “Parasite,” a South Korean film that won Best Picture in 2019, that starred a predominately South Korean cast and crew. The reporter informed Mikkelson that “Parasite: would be eligible for the top honor under the new rules, but that his film with an “all-Nordic cast” would not be.

I get what the reporter was trying to say. Why is Parasite, a complete Korean production with a full Korean cast eligible for Oscar nominations, but a Movie with an all white cast isn’t? Where was the diversity in the Korean Movie?

— Tom F. (@Jingoku) September 8, 2023

Arcel had had enough of the diversity questioning and stepped in to shut the reporter down.

“First of all, the film takes place in Denmark in the 1750s,” he told the reporter.

“We do have a big plot line about a girl of color who is being subjected to racism, which was very rare, any people of color in Denmark… almost, nobody. She was probably at the time the only one in the entire country of Denmark,” Arcel stated. “It wasn’t a thought in our mind. I think it would be a little weird, it’s just historical, it’s just how it was in the 1750s.”

Mikkelsen plays Ludvig von Khalen in the movie. He is a soldier who “arrives in 1755 on the barren Jutland heath with a single goal: to follow the king’s call to cultivate the land and thereby achieve wealth and honor himself,” according to IMDb.

Mads’s new Danish film The Promised Land/Bastarden has been selected for the Telluride film fest in Colorado on 31 Aug to 4 Sept!

Just putting this out there in case any fannibals nearby might like to catch the film early in its US premiere☺️

Via: https://t.co/Mw5pzqTxGp pic.twitter.com/vG6LbjwswP

— Isabel (@latteteacup10) August 30, 2023

“The Academy Awards have faced criticism after implementing new diversity and inclusion guidelines for 2024. The guidelines must be adhered to by any film to be considered for Best Picture,” Fox News reported.

“Several voting members sounded the alarm after the Academy Awards released its Aperture 2025 initiative, a sweeping set of regulations designed to make Hollywood more equitable and diverse,” the media outlet continued.

The batty guidelines will go a long way toward destroying film creativity in the industry.

None of these previous winners would now qualify under these rules:

Spotlight
Argo
The Kings Speech
Ben Hur
Return Of The King
A Beautiful Mind
American Beauty
Annie Hall
Titanic
Braveheart
Schindler’s List
Rain Man
Amadeus
The Godfather
Chariots Of Fire

And several more..

— Paul McCloud ⚔️ (@PaulMcCloud46) September 9, 2023

“Beginning in 2024, film producers and directors will be required to submit to the Academy a dossier of the sort that points to the race, gender, sexual orientation, and disability status of their film’s cast and crew members. Veteran actor Richard Dreyfuss has condemned Hollywood’s new inclusivity standards in strong terms, claiming they make him ‘vomit,'” Fox News noted.

The Oscars also came out with controversial guidelines in 2020, claiming the new rules “are designed to encourage equitable representation on and off the screen in order to better reflect the diversity of the movie-going audience.”

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