Babette's Feast (1987)
Country: DK
Technical: col 103m
Director: Gabriel Axel
Cast: Stéphane Audran, Jean-Philippe Lafont
Synopsis:
The two spinster daughters of the deceased pastor of a small Jutland community continue his charitable works and struggle to keep their ageing flock from the temptations of rancour and discord. As the centenary of the great man's birth approaches, their penniless French servant asks if she may use her lottery winnings to prepare a celebratory dinner, an experience all the invitees look forward to with increasing apprehension.
Review:
A delightful film about the value of artistry and the repayment of debts, from a Karen Blixen novella. The film-making is simplicity itself, with nothing more florid than a pan, which only goes to serve the spiritual (not to say culinary) values of the story the better. Audran is a monument of moving understatement in a tale whose defining theme is humility itself: each sister loses an opportunity of escape from her meagre existence, and these work together to bring about a fulfilment of withheld promise. The dinner is a profound emotional, and artistic, experience.
Country: DK
Technical: col 103m
Director: Gabriel Axel
Cast: Stéphane Audran, Jean-Philippe Lafont
Synopsis:
The two spinster daughters of the deceased pastor of a small Jutland community continue his charitable works and struggle to keep their ageing flock from the temptations of rancour and discord. As the centenary of the great man's birth approaches, their penniless French servant asks if she may use her lottery winnings to prepare a celebratory dinner, an experience all the invitees look forward to with increasing apprehension.
Review:
A delightful film about the value of artistry and the repayment of debts, from a Karen Blixen novella. The film-making is simplicity itself, with nothing more florid than a pan, which only goes to serve the spiritual (not to say culinary) values of the story the better. Audran is a monument of moving understatement in a tale whose defining theme is humility itself: each sister loses an opportunity of escape from her meagre existence, and these work together to bring about a fulfilment of withheld promise. The dinner is a profound emotional, and artistic, experience.
Country: DK
Technical: col 103m
Director: Gabriel Axel
Cast: Stéphane Audran, Jean-Philippe Lafont
Synopsis:
The two spinster daughters of the deceased pastor of a small Jutland community continue his charitable works and struggle to keep their ageing flock from the temptations of rancour and discord. As the centenary of the great man's birth approaches, their penniless French servant asks if she may use her lottery winnings to prepare a celebratory dinner, an experience all the invitees look forward to with increasing apprehension.
Review:
A delightful film about the value of artistry and the repayment of debts, from a Karen Blixen novella. The film-making is simplicity itself, with nothing more florid than a pan, which only goes to serve the spiritual (not to say culinary) values of the story the better. Audran is a monument of moving understatement in a tale whose defining theme is humility itself: each sister loses an opportunity of escape from her meagre existence, and these work together to bring about a fulfilment of withheld promise. The dinner is a profound emotional, and artistic, experience.