Babette's Feast -- What Makes This Movie Great? (Episode 125)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ย. 2021
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A lot of people think this is a movie about food... how wrong they are! It's a film about art and joy and what it means to be alive. So much subtle beauty and humanity in these characters. My all time favorite foreign film.
It's about art and joy on a superficial level. In truth, it's a deeply spiritual, specifically Christian, film. It's about the limitations of human choice to find worldly happiness (Kierkegaard's Either/Or), transfiguration through grace, and apokatastasis, the reconciliation of all things in the world to come, with Babette's feast being a kind of type for the Lord's Supper or Kingdom of God, which has both a present and a future consumation.
What you said is true, but the food scenes are great.
I saw it first when my life was in turmoil and I was down and out because of a dire relationship with my husband. I was so filled by the inner meaning of this movie that I immediately
could relate to any kind of pain and sorrow at that very personal life time. That's the essence of the movie, that is transforming our suffering and struggles into a higher perspective and offering a 'zenith position' point of view of human smallness. So eye wide opening for the viewer who opens to the Ascending Sophia, so to speak.❤❤❤❤
Babette's Feast is about the grace of God, which is something that is benevolent, beautiful, brings people together and has immense beauty, and is freely given, HOWEVER people don't know how to appreciate it. People use to associate God with sterility, with something tasteless, but the great universe God has created is colorful, beautiful and why not, tasty!
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. It speaks to so many levels, the power of an artist‘s drive, of love, of faith. It’s one of the few examples where the film is equal to the written work and even a little superior because we have the visual joy of the meal’s creation and witnessing it work it’s magic.
A timeless delight.
Watched it on TV when I was a teenager. I was told that it was a food movie. The contrast between the dull colours of country life and the spectacle of the feast created some kind of sublime emotion in me. During those times I thought that life is colorful because of romance and this movie kept me thinking.
excellent, it's always great when movies stick with us for awhile tlike that.
Ju
I will never forget the words of Martine and her old suitor after the feast is over, painfully beautiful moment.
yes, and that is a moment worth watcdhing the movie for.
One of my all time favorite films. 🧡
excellent! a great one to be on that list.
Great review
Just a bit of context, Babette is a refugee from the Franco Prussian war, She has lost her son & husband in the war so she's homeless widow, homeless & single, past her youth
I've always seen this film as a great illustration of sacrificial love... the women not seeing Babette & how she shows love till this moment & the sacrifice of her finances (and freedom/ independence), to enrich the lives of the women & community took her in & showed her very practical kindness
oh, thank you. Appreciate this.
Hands down my favourite movie of all time. The legendary Karl Lagerfeld designed his friend, Audran’s costumes. I was also tickled pink that it was based on a Dinesen short story; I can totally envision Streep telling this story at the dinner table lol
excellent! thank you.
Take a look at the flow of Babette’s cape when she takes the various foods out of the boats bringing it to shore. Clearly the mark of a great designer: Lagerfeld.
Mine, too.
nice notice!@@kathleenbergeron1292
I agree with all those assessments, and yet I am left with another important one....the transformative potential of food made with love. The meal was an expressive art form that was able to bring this group of fussy adults together, who had developed lifetimes of squabbles and resentments and allow them to open up and talk with honesty, without pretense and heal wounds that have festered for years. I truly feel that this came about because of the love put into that special meal... and maybe a little from the alcohol served. That was a powerful notion I was also left with.
Thank you for your review of one of my favorite all time films.
Very grateful you recommended this movie. I believe great art can refine our humanity and this film plays that out nicely.
thank you.
The beauty of this movie is balance between austerity and ,modesty v ostentation and vanity .It catches you by surprise and the ending is spectacular because of HOW many of those elements actually gel and the symbolism is terrific. 1st class.
Probably one of the greatest films ever made based on one of the most insightful stories ever written. I am lucky to have met and talked to the great chef, Lasse Sorenson, who worked on creating the feast for the movie. He currently produces an amazing TV series called Food Is Love in St. Louis. The reach of this story just keeps on going! I know Orthodox and Catholic priests who have used the film to help teach theological truths, Episcopalians and Protestants who highly value the film for its religious revelations. Truly a gem. Thank you for this video discussion. The food connection is vital, obviously, to the story as it represents a type of Eucharistic meal. So perfectly introduced into the stark, deprived landscape of the world Babbette found herself in. The founder of their faith was very limited in his knowledge of Christianity, clinging to a pared down, reformed reaction to Catholicism. Had he leap-frogged back in time to the early Church Fathers and studied Orthodox Christianity, things might have ended differently for his 2 daughters. Who knows?
This is a GREAT film. Bishop Barron gives a marvelous review of it in his forward to his book, "The Eucharist".
I do not at all believe in an afterlife. Yet I was touched by Babette's decision of spending de 10 000 euros on the feast. It touched me because I saw it as art having intrinsic value, that utility, money, rewards are not the real motivation for creating beauty, excellence is sufficient in itself.
very well said. thank you.
Bravo…that’s my takeaway as well
Had this on my list then I saw you have a it a 5 in letterboxd, so I was like ok I need to watch this now, and man what a beautiful touching film. It was funny and playful with its message while giving us some oddly genuine romance.
One of the best great review
An important detail that might be missed, Babettes husband and son are killed during the civil war in France so she fled France to save her own life. She was a prominent chef that served the French General responsible for the death of her husband and son. Gen Lorens was a guest of the French Gen. as a reward for a riding competition. He intuitively recalls the dishes served to him in his youth.
excellent! thank you.
watched in 1987 and a fave!!!!!!
I think this movie , speaks about the idea of giving and empathy
Beyond the food, this film mainly talks about pleasure, which was perceived at the beginning of the plot as pleasure of the devil (duo of Don Giovanni). At the end, and thanks to the feast concocted by Babette, the pleasure became not sin but virtuous. This dinner made it possible to erase all the tangles of the guests, as if by magic. Their austerity shell melted like snow in the sun, and they revealed the best of their nature. The general could repeat all his love to Martine. We went from a very austere general atmosphere to that of the last Parisian salon where we talk, a glass of digestive in hand while listening to music.
The officer in the movie looks as if he worked in a Bergman movie. I will research it. Although, I doubt there is an afterlife, in my version it is full of great food, music, art, books, films and beautiful people.
I always wanted to know what life had in store for the young boy who assisted Babette, in preparing and serving the feast. He all of a sudden had this outlook into a completely different world - with expensive and unimaginable dishes, exquisite glass and cutlery, and with the fine art of serving a rather large company (where not all guests are equal). And he mastered his tasks quite nicely. Did he get a good education, go to Copenhagen, find a nice job, develop his talents?
So many questions ;-)
Aww, I love this film. Funnily enough It's become my family's favorite Xmas movie!
really a great movie to watch at Xmas time. thank you for this suggestion.
@@LearningaboutMovies thank you for the video!
It is a brilliant Christmas movie even though the setting is not. I would rank it up there with A Muppet Christmas Carol and the 1984 film with George C. Scott.
this is the pope's favourite movie..and my mom's as well...and it ends up liking pretty much everybody I present to....a jewel...."do you consider a life of achievements is in the end....a defeat....?? powerfull words..
Les cailles en sarcophage... I could kill for it !!!
My favorite food movies in alphabetic order are:
Babette's Feast - 1987
Big Night - 1996
Eat Drink Man Woman - 1994
Tampopo - 1985
Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? - 1978
I would have included The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie from 1972, only the characters in that movie never actually manage to have a meal, with the exception of a meagre late night snack by one of the famished characters in the next to last scene.
Have you seen Like water for chocolate?
@@BrenB125 I have not seen that one yet, but I should track it down.
My all time favorite movie.
It is a fight between the spiritual and the temporal.
A superb film
yes!
My boss (a wine importer) is hosting a viewing of the movie and recreating the feast complete with wine pairings. I'm really looking forward to it!
have a great time!
This movie and eat drink man woman are 2 of my favorite movies.
An exercise in staying true to their faith ("we will not talk about the food") yet each course was a real delight to their senses (spoiler alert: a close-up shot of a diner who found the water bland so red wine was the choice!).
That only seniors were given flesh in the very austere backdrop is another indication how these characters are "stuck" in their old ways AKA tradition and not even Babette 's feast (a communion of the flesh and the spirit, the here and now) was given its place where it belongs: a blessing indeed and in fact which the Chef has graciously and generously given and granted.
The General's toast about was is granted could've the words spoken at the Last Supper: take and eat... take and drink.
Great movie!
Incredible movie, watching it today, it is part of my chrishmas movie collection 😊❤
Augsburg Confession, commonly known as Lutheran (not Calvinist). The Church of Denmark is low-church form Lutheran, also Norway. Sweden and Finland are high-church form (full mass). In the 1800s there was a piety movement in the Northern churches. Later in the century there was a "Catholic movement", in Sweden, to restore parts of the mass that had been removed over prior years.
It looks as if this was a piety movement in the established (state) church of Denmark.
I actually watched this movie. It was mentioned during Hubert Dreyfus's Heidegger lectures and I got curious. Well made, but that's about it.
1000x better if you know the version of Protestantism depicted in the film very well.
Remember that "feast" in the Christian saint's calendar is not a feast of food, but a spiritual feast. I think this is key to understanding the film.
A religious feast is about sacrifice , in a way, but also about rejoicing and thanksgiving. Her material gift to these people is great and very Christian. She is not very much like them, they don't understand her, but her gift is overflowing with love. Christianity says it's easy to love people you want to love, and that that is not really a virtue. She sacrifices all her material winnings and also uses her creative and professional skills ( she is finally not hiding her light under a bushel--St Paul) to bring them something that pours out of her talents. I think the feast is a gift to them to open them to the joys of life, which though material and extravagant, are gifts from God. The way she prepares it has a kind of pagan alchemy which warms these people up, makes them more aware and sensitive and more willing to connect with others in joyful fellowship. The Catholic warmth and material pleasures presented are a contrast to the Protestant puritanism, and clearly unleashes a power that is a good lesson to these spiritually and materially deprived people.
Babette had lost her husband and son to the excesses in Paris. Her life is also in threat there. "Righteousness and bliss have kissed one another!" It's the righteousness of the two sisters who go door feeding the poor and take Babette in. It's the bliss of the sumptuous meal that Babette creates as well as better food for all of the sisters' charges.
Finally saw this movie tonight after meaning to get around to it for fifteen years. This is a great response to it. I was struck by the odd view they have of the wedding at Cana: They cite it as they attempt to tell one another that food and drink don’t matter, but the event is only notable for Jesus stepping in to keep the wine flowing when it had run out.
That plus they have the manna in the Exodus, Jesus as the "bread of life," and so on. Keep it flowing!
Look for Delicious...also a great film.
thank you.
A feast is defined as “an elaborate and usually abundant meal often accompanied by a ceremony or entertainment: BANQUET; something that gives unusual or abundant enjoyment; a periodic religious observance commemorating an event or honoring a deity, person, or thing” (Merriam-Webster). While Babette’s feast commemorates the centennial of the deceased sect founder, it is devoid of overt religiosity. The entertainment, as such, is provided in the form of the general’s explanatory narrative. The enjoyment is both abundant and, to the simple villagers, unusual - they are used to the porridge of plain fish that before Babette’s appearance in the village had been prepared by the sisters in a plebeian (“crude or coarse in manner or style: common”) manner devoid of sensual pleasure, i.e., sustenance without spiritual transcendence. The presentation of the food and its service comprises the ceremony of the banquet.
As I see it, Babette’s feast is seductive to both eye and palate, gustatorially sublime and transcendent. Its seductive qualities are seen in the flush of the diners’ cheeks, the sparkle in their eyes, the smacking of lips and smiles coaxed from visages unwilling to express any pleasure, indeed, joined in a pact not to do so; in the confidential confessions coaxed from hitherto unspoken privacies. The feast has inspired those simple people to open their hearts and souls to each other in a kind of nonreligious baptism: “an act, experience, or ordeal by which one is purified, sanctified, initiated, or named” (Merriam-Webster). There is a series of acts performed in a set manner, akin to those typical of formal religious observance as performed in an ecclesiastical setting yet completely natural and unassuming, unpretentious (i.e., free from ostentation or affectation). The courses are presented in a set service by the young lad (Babette’s nephew, I think) in accordance with Babette’s precise instructions: a service without services.
The sisters didn’t understand what the ingredients signified, how they would be transformed by Babette, just as Babette had transformed their lives and the lives of all the townsfolk. In their religiously-fueled ignorance they could only see witchcraft as the explanation for the science that they couldn’t otherwise explain. Their kitchen had become - as it had been ever since Babette had come to them - Babette’s laboratory.
The film IMO showcases the splendor of Man in Babette’s transformation of ordinary animals and plants into a glorious, sensuous feast: the turtle, the truffle, the caviar, the foie gras (be still, my heart!), the grapes of joyousness, et cetera. All at table are seduced by this hitherto-disguised French chef into enjoying themselves despite their vows of gustatory celibacy. If this is witchcraft, then it’s white witchcraft.
The irreconcilable differences between and among the townsfolk began AFTER their Founder’s death. In fact, it was his (His?) absence that allowed them to slip into sins of infidelity: lying and cheating. Sins that were confessed and forgiven through Babette’s manna from the heaven/haven of the kitchen, formerly so ill-used and ill-considered by Martine and Philippa.
Babette asserts that an artist is never poor. The sisters, otoh, see life as poverty. They believe that Babette’s talents will only be fully appreciated AFTER HER DEATH! OMFG! Says Philippa to Babette: “In Paradise you will be the great artist that God meant you to be.” Philippa’s eyes glisten with tears. But Babette’s eyes are dry, she who had never attended the organized worship of the town - Lorens and Achille had attended, in both cases for ulterior motives, but Babette wasn’t a hypocrite. Her great art has been served up to Philippa, whose misinterpretation doesn’t bother Babette because Babette knows that she is that great artist in the here-and-now, she doesn’t have to be dead to be fully appreciated. She can, she MUST, fully exercise her abilities and express her talents while she lives; this centenary celebration may be her last chance. It may also be, because of the setting and the reluctance of the participants, her greatest gift to HERSELF.
This is transcendence without the adornment of religious spirituality. I contend that the spiritual is not solely the province of the supernatural. And this IMO is the essential meaning of *BABETTE’S FEAST*
thank you.
Food unites as well divides us .No matter where we come from , when we eat there is a feeling of oneness .However what we eat is very different .Thus the feast itself serves as a coming together of the orthodox protestants of the village with the outside world of excess ( note that these people would have probably never spent any amount of money on themselves ) .to me this is where the rigidity is conflicted against art ,in the form of food .It is like a classic way of saying - " you know , the rules can be broken "
Of course this is a personal take , agree with some of the points you made , disagree with some .
thank you!
That's close to one of the themes, yes. The Pietists have become formulaic and stale and have lost a mystical vision- they, like the General, are also subject to human finitude. They cannot, through their own religious piety, actualize what they seek. They also need grace. Babette is that grace, who sacrifices everything she has as an act of love, and is welcomed into the community as a sister, when before she was just an outsider (owing to her Catholicism). Babette also finds transfiguration and salvation, not just the Pietists.
This echoes Jesus' parable of the Unjust Steward:
"“And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by means of the mammon of unrighteousness; that when it fails, they may receive you into eternal dwellings." (Luke 16:9).
Many feast days throughout the year in the Catholic Church.
the menues in the movie are very small, i doubt anybody would have really filled up afterwards. And 10 000 francs is way too much for the menu. There was a famous much larger and expensive menue over nine hours in the Cafe Anglais in 1866 with Emperor of Russia and Kin of Prussia which cost 400 per person. So i guess 1000-2000 francs for babettes menu are more realistic in 1880 or 1890.
In the short story the her husband and son were killed by the French General who patronized her resturant. The were part of the Paris uprising
🎵🎶🎵🎶 🎂. Champagne 🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🥂🥂🥂🥂.
Have you seen Mostly Martha?
No, is it worth it?
That's a great one too.
Further this movies is about how we define our lives in terms of excess versus moderation. The community has lived a life of strict moderation never excess and have to compromise their values for one night of extravagant excess for a worthy cause. what do they chose and was that as simple a choice???
thank you.
One of my favorite films! I think your timeline is a little off. Babbette fled Paris because of the reign of terror (1793-1794) so that would make it the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century.
thank you.
Babette was not involved in the French revolution of the late 1700's. She was a Comunard in the Revolution of 1871 (less well known because it was put down).
I think it's late 19th century, Paris Commune times. The art shown in the film is 19th century Lutheran religious art, it wasn't present in the 18th century. The clothing style is also 19th century.
The action takes place during the second part of the XIXth century.
Café Anglais was not open yet late in the XVIIIth century....
All things are possible with God.
I want to watch it but dnt know where to watch it. Plz help me
check the entry on letterboxd. It'll say where to find any movie streaming in your country, legally.
Thanks
@@Osheen92 you can rent it on TH-cam
But i couldn't find any download link plz share it
Huge spoiler, man!
boohoo. I tend to give spoiler alerts, yet the real ethic for all viewers on all sites is caveat spoiler. You know this. Every trailer has them -- they show final shots of movies -- and spoilers are routine even in summaries on major sites. Go complain to the greater powers that be that do this, like the NYT, Wikipedia, etc.
yikes,,, enuf with the 'old',,,, we can see their age.... Can we go for 'now they are older'. (hint: older people prefer to be called 'Older'........ Can people use 'older' please,,,, i'm their age, i don't feel 'Old',,,,, i may look a bit older and be a bit older,,,, but im not Old,,,,,
something is wrong with your keyboard.