Land and Sons takes a thoughtful, disciplined approach to a problem faced by all agricultural countries-the separation of the generations with modernization. The economic base of the city's lure is underscored by the film's 1937 depression setting. Einer is a young man, eager for change, who tries to convince his aging father to sell their small farm (part of a cooperative) and move with him to the city. The father refuses, but his imminent death leaves Einer with a freedom that gives him pause. Gudmundsson's film honors the depth and complexity of this dual desire-to leave, and also to stay, with the land, family, and, in Einer's case, lover of one's home.
"(O)ur education neglected to remind us to remember, much less to grieve, what once happened to our families. Land and Sons gives us back the understanding grief which is the least our forbears deserve from us. And with a profound visual alchemy it gives them back the land: the camera makes the land look like what it is, not a backdrop but something quietly alive, a great life upon which the small lives of us take shape. It's as though the people in the movie are being watched from the point of view of the land...as though the grief at their loss is the land's own grief." --M.V., L.A. Weekly, April 1981