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Babette's Feast
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Babette's Feast
Babette's Feast (Danish: Babettes Gæstebud) is a 1987 Danish drama film directed by Gabriel Axel. The screenplay, written by Axel, was based on the 1958 story by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen). It was produced by Just Betzer, Bo Christensen and Benni Korzen, with funding from the Danish Film Institute. It stars Stéphane Audran, Birgitte Federspiel, and Bodil Kjer.
Babette's Feast was met with widespread critical acclaim and became the first Danish film to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. It was also the first Danish cinema film of a Blixen story.
The film premiered in the Un Certain Regard section of the 1987 Cannes Film Festival.
The elderly and pious Protestant sisters Martine and Filippa live in a small village on the remote western coast of Jutland in 19th-century Denmark. Their late father was a pastor who founded his own Pietistic conventicle. Lacking new converts, the aging sisters preside over a dwindling, elderly congregation.
Forty-nine years before, the sisters had many suitors, but their father rejected them, to retain the women’s assistance with his pastoral mission. Martine was courted by a young Swedish cavalry officer, Lorens Löwenhielm, who was visiting Jutland. Filippa was courted by the famous baritone Achille Papin, on hiatus from the Paris Opera. Both sisters spurned their suitors and stayed with their father.
Thirty-five years later, Babette Hersant appears at their door. She carries a letter from Papin which explains that she is a refugee from counter-revolutionary bloodshed in Paris and recommends her as a housekeeper. The sisters cannot afford to employ Babette, but she begs to work for free. Babette serves as their cook for the next fourteen years, producing improved versions of the bland meals typical of the abstemious nature of the congregation and gaining their respect, and that of the other locals. As the years go by, the sisters are deeply distressed by the increasing number of disputes between the congregants. Babette is also troubled, and at one point, interrupts the arguments with a stern rebuke.
Babette's only link to her former life is a lottery ticket. A Parisian friend annually renews the ticket. One day, she wins the lottery and receives 10,000 francs. After her win she decides to prepare a dinner for the sisters and their small congregation on the occasion of the founding pastor's hundredth birthday. More than just a feast, the meal is an outpouring of Babette's appreciation, an act of self-sacrifice.
The sisters accept both Babette's meal and her offer to pay for the creation of a "real French dinner." Babette arranges for her nephew to go to Paris and gather the supplies for the feast. The ingredients are plentiful, sumptuous and exotic, and their arrival causes much consternation and discussion among the villagers. As the various never-before-seen ingredients arrive and preparations commence, the sisters begin to worry that the meal will become a sin of sensual luxury, if not some form of devilry. In a hasty conference, the sisters and the congregation agree to eat the meal, but to forgo speaking of any pleasure in it and to make no mention of the food during the dinner.
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Babette's Feast
Babette's Feast (Danish: Babettes Gæstebud) is a 1987 Danish drama film directed by Gabriel Axel. The screenplay, written by Axel, was based on the 1958 story by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen). It was produced by Just Betzer, Bo Christensen and Benni Korzen, with funding from the Danish Film Institute. It stars Stéphane Audran, Birgitte Federspiel, and Bodil Kjer.
Babette's Feast was met with widespread critical acclaim and became the first Danish film to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. It was also the first Danish cinema film of a Blixen story.
The film premiered in the Un Certain Regard section of the 1987 Cannes Film Festival.
The elderly and pious Protestant sisters Martine and Filippa live in a small village on the remote western coast of Jutland in 19th-century Denmark. Their late father was a pastor who founded his own Pietistic conventicle. Lacking new converts, the aging sisters preside over a dwindling, elderly congregation.
Forty-nine years before, the sisters had many suitors, but their father rejected them, to retain the women’s assistance with his pastoral mission. Martine was courted by a young Swedish cavalry officer, Lorens Löwenhielm, who was visiting Jutland. Filippa was courted by the famous baritone Achille Papin, on hiatus from the Paris Opera. Both sisters spurned their suitors and stayed with their father.
Thirty-five years later, Babette Hersant appears at their door. She carries a letter from Papin which explains that she is a refugee from counter-revolutionary bloodshed in Paris and recommends her as a housekeeper. The sisters cannot afford to employ Babette, but she begs to work for free. Babette serves as their cook for the next fourteen years, producing improved versions of the bland meals typical of the abstemious nature of the congregation and gaining their respect, and that of the other locals. As the years go by, the sisters are deeply distressed by the increasing number of disputes between the congregants. Babette is also troubled, and at one point, interrupts the arguments with a stern rebuke.
Babette's only link to her former life is a lottery ticket. A Parisian friend annually renews the ticket. One day, she wins the lottery and receives 10,000 francs. After her win she decides to prepare a dinner for the sisters and their small congregation on the occasion of the founding pastor's hundredth birthday. More than just a feast, the meal is an outpouring of Babette's appreciation, an act of self-sacrifice.
The sisters accept both Babette's meal and her offer to pay for the creation of a "real French dinner." Babette arranges for her nephew to go to Paris and gather the supplies for the feast. The ingredients are plentiful, sumptuous and exotic, and their arrival causes much consternation and discussion among the villagers. As the various never-before-seen ingredients arrive and preparations commence, the sisters begin to worry that the meal will become a sin of sensual luxury, if not some form of devilry. In a hasty conference, the sisters and the congregation agree to eat the meal, but to forgo speaking of any pleasure in it and to make no mention of the food during the dinner.