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Corporate salesman Steve Butler (Damon) arrives in a rural town with his sales partner, Sue Thomason (McDormand). With the town having been hit hard by the economic decline of recent years, the two outsiders see the local citizens as likely to accept their company's offer, for drilling rights to their properties, as much-needed relief. What seems like an easy job for the duo becomes complicated by the objection of a respected schoolteacher (Holbrook) with support from a grassroots campaign led by another man (Krasinski) who counters Steve both personally and professionally.
Trivia:
Originally, this movie was supposed to be Matt Damon's directorial debut. But due to short time to prepare for the movie and also some creative conflicts, Damon dropped out as the director (but remained as an actor) and Gus Van Sant came aboard to direct.
Rob, a store clerk who appears throughout the movie, is played by Titus Welliver, immediately recognizable to Lost fans as the "Man in Black." Subtle homage is played to this in Sue's final visit to the store. The vantage point is from within the store. The glass door, through which the viewer sees Sue approaching, is slightly off center and the camera pulled back just enough to show some local ads and announcements. Most of them are illegible, but one stands out with big bold letters across the top that read "L O S T" (followed by some smaller print and pictures of a cat).
This is the second film co-starring John Krasinski with the major contribution by writer David Eggers. Eggers who also wrote 2006 Away We Go which also starred Krasinski.
According to NYTimes report, when Promised Land opened at the Southside Mall in Oneonta, NY in January 2013, some moviegoers wore buttons protesting hydraulic fracturing (i.e. fracking), and windows in town displayed signs warning of its possible environmental hazards. Meanwhile, pro-fracking citizens responded with homemade signs stating, 'Let's boost our local economy' and 'Support safe drilling and pipelines, jobs.'
Cinematographer Linus Sandgren shot the film with Hawk V-Lite 1.3x squeeze anamorphic lenses on 4-perf Super 35 for a final aspect ratio of 1.85:1. According to him this is the first time this combination has been used on a feature film (he and others had used it before on commercials), and the negative area used was 70% larger than that of regular 1.85:1 and 30% larger than 3-perf Super 35.