Babette arranges for her nephew to go to Paris and gather the supplies for the feast. The sisters accept both Babette's meal and her offer to pay for the creation of a 'real French dinner'. More than just a feast, the meal is an outpouring of Babette's appreciation, an act of self-sacrifice. After her win she decides to prepare a delicious dinner for the sisters and their small congregation on the occasion of the founding pastor's hundredth birthday. One day, she wins the lottery and receives 10,000 francs. A Parisian friend annually renews the ticket. Babette is also troubled, and at one point, interrupts the arguments with a stern rebuke.īabette's only link to her former life is a lottery ticket.

As the years go by, the sisters are deeply distressed by the increasing number of querulous arguments between the congregants. Babette serves as their cook for the next 14 years, producing improved versions of the bland meals typical of the abstemious nature of the congregation and slowly gaining their respect, and that of the other local inhabitants. The sisters cannot afford to employ Babette, but she begs to work for free. She carries a letter from Papin, who in it explains that she is a refugee from counter-revolutionary bloodshed in Paris and recommends her as a housekeeper. Thirty-five years later, Babette Hersant ( Stéphane Audran) appears at their door. Both sisters decide to spurn their suitors and stay with their father. Filippa is courted by a famous baritone, Achille Papin, from the Paris Opera, on hiatus to enjoy the silence of the coast.

Martine is courted by an impassioned young Swedish cavalry officer, Lorens Löwenhielm, who is visiting Jutland. They have many suitors, but their father rejects them, as he selfishly wishes to retain the assistance of the young women to further his pastoral mission. The story flashes back 49 years, showing the sisters in their youthful loveliness. Lacking new converts, the aging sisters preside over a dwindling, but faithful, elderly congregation. Their late father was a pastor who founded his own Pietistic conventicle. The elderly and pious Protestant sisters Martine ( Birgitte Federspiel) and Filippa ( Bodil Kjer) live in a small village on the remote western coast of Jutland in 19th-century Denmark. The film premiered in the Un Certain Regard section of the 1987 Cannes Film Festival.

It was also the first Danish film to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. It was produced by Just Betzer, Bo Christensen and Benni Korzen, with funding from the Danish Film Institute.īabette's Feast was the first Danish cinema film of a Blixen story. The screenplay, written by Axel, was based on the 1958 story of the same name by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen). Babette's Feast ( Danish: Babettes Gæstebud) is a 1987 Danish drama film directed by Gabriel Axel.

Babette's feast short story