Based on Norwegian author Knut Hamsun’s Nobel Prize-winning novel The Growth of the Soil, this silent movie was enthusiastically received when it was first released in 1921. Assumed lost for decades The Growth of the Soil appears in a carefully restored version, in which the drama of the pioneer farmer Isak and his struggle to conquer the wilderness and wring a living out of it for himself and his family, is accompanied by the much acclaimed original music score by Leif Halvorsen, performed by the Norwegian Radio Orchestra conducted by Frank Strobel. The film appears in a carefully restored version and is considered as a pillar of European silent film.