Film

Land

Name: Land
Genre: Drama
Released: 2021
Cast: Robin Wright, Demián Bichir, Sarah Dawn Pledge, Kim Dickens, Warren Christie

Drama
Slow-burning

A woman retreats to the Colorado wilderness after personal devastation, learning survival and redemption through isolation and unexpected human connection. Robin Wright delivers a quietly powerful performance in this meditative film about grief, resilience, and finding reasons to go on. It's patient, visually stunning, and emotionally honest—for those who want depth over plot.

TMDb rating

3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you want a quiet, patient study of grief told through landscape and silence, where a lean running time and sparse talk let the mountains do most of the talking.

Skip it if you need plot momentum or a clear sense of where things are heading; this moves slowly and trusts its quiet, which can feel like waiting for something to happen.

What it asks of you: Patience: it runs under ninety minutes but feels unhurried, and it asks you to sit with long stretches of stillness and wide, cold silence without being rescued by plot.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Into the Wild2007

Jon Krakauer's true story of a young idealist seeking meaning in nature's extreme spaces. Like Land, it asks whether wilderness offers escape or truth—and what it costs to find out.

But The pacing is deliberate and the ending is devastating. It rewards contemplation, not entertainment.

Leave the World Behind2023

A family confronting catastrophe through isolation and forced self-reckoning. Both films sit quietly with grief and ask how people rebuild when everything breaks, with minimal plot machinery.

But Emotionally demanding and ambiguous. Some viewers find it frustratingly slow and its refusal to explain everything maddening.

The Farewell2019

Lulu Wang captures the weight of loss and the struggle to stay present when your mind wants to flee. Like Land, it's about choosing connection over isolation, told with unexpected warmth.

But The tone shifts between comedy and sorrow. Some find this tonal balance jarring rather than moving.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Land

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

My Own Private Idaho1991

Both use geography and isolation as metaphors for internal states, and both find profound beauty in what society discards—but Van Sant aestheticizes wandering where Land locates meaning in staying put.

Gus Van Sant's poetic elegy for lost youth on the road. Robin Wright herself appears here—but this is the inverse of Land: movement instead of stillness, youth instead of middle age, the city instead of wilderness. Both films use landscape as emotional truth.

But Avant-garde and sexually explicit. The narrative is dreamlike and deliberately fragmented; it demands an entirely different pace from viewer and patience with formal experiment.

Nomadland2021

Chloé Zhao's portrait of reinvention through distance and work. Both films find meaning in hardship and show how landscape becomes not escape but reckoning.

But Quiet and cyclical rather than narrative-driven. Feels more like immersion than story, which some find undramatic.

A Ghost Story2017

David Lowery's meditation on grief, time, and what tethers us to places. Both films trust silence and visual storytelling over explanation or catharsis.

But Abstract and strange. The supernatural framing confuses some viewers, and the pacing is intentionally mournful.

Manchester by the Sea2016

Casey Affleck as a man broken by tragedy, moving through life in fragments. Both films refuse easy healing and explore how people carry unbearable weight.

But Relentlessly bleak. There's no redemptive arc, which some find punishing rather than cathartic.

Certain Women2016

Kelly Reichardt's sparse portrait of quiet lives and unmet needs in rural spaces. Both find drama in isolation, restraint, and what's left unsaid between people.

But Deliberately anticlimactic. If you need clear character arcs and resolutions, this feels deliberately frustrating.

The Lighthouse2019

Two men isolated against nature and each other, grappling with survival and meaning. Both are visually hypnotic studies of solitude and what drives a person to breaking.

But Black-and-white, experimental sound design, and abstract psychological tension. It's visceral and unsettling rather than contemplative.

Lean on Pete2018

A young man traversing the country with a horse, learning survival and compassion. Like Land, it's a quiet journey about finding footing after displacement, with strong performances anchoring sparse storytelling.

But Bleak and often difficult. The story unfolds without much narrative satisfaction, and its worldview is fairly dark.

Y Gwyll2013

Both show wilderness and remoteness not as healing spaces but as mirrors: characters retreat to wild places hoping for renewal and find instead that they must confront exactly what they fled.

A Welsh crime series where grief-stricken detective Tom Mathias investigates the dark underbelly of rural isolation. Like Land, it understands that wilderness and small communities hold secrets and trauma, not escape—and that being near nature doesn't heal brokenness.

But It's a detective procedural, darker and plot-heavy than Land. If you want meditative and character-focused, the genre machinery might feel intrusive.

The Platform2019

Where Land asks if solitude can heal, The Platform asks what happens when isolation is forced and connection becomes transgression. Both are radical meditations on survival and what it costs.

A Spanish science-fiction thriller about a vertical prison where survival means radical isolation or connection—the inverse of Land's choice. Both explore how systems force us to choose between dignity and survival, and ask what we owe each other.

But It's brutal and allegorical rather than intimate. The violence is visceral and metaphorical rather than naturalistic, which some find exploitative or too abstract.