Babette’s Feast

Originally published as part of the Arts & Faith top 100.

“Babette can cook.” It’s a seemingly simple sentence offered as an offhand suggestion in a letter to Danish sisters Martine and Filippa (Birgitte Federspiel and Bodil Kjer) as one way an unknown refugee from France could help them should they take her in. And yet, the understatement and simplicity of that line perfectly foreshadows the greatness of the gift that Babette’s titular feast will be.

The first time we see Babette (Stephane Audran), it’s not the image of her seeking shelter in the pouring rain, but preparing a simple meal while the two sisters with whom she lives host their weekly prayer service. When the small religious community begins singing, “Jerusalem, my heart’s true home,” there is a cut to Babette in the kitchen. Yet again, it is a subtle detail foreshadowing where Babette’s feast will lead those who partake of it.

Similar to those miniscule details, which escape the notice of most of the characters, the feast itself is almost not noticed for what it truly is either. Only one character knows and appreciates the value of the gift Babette is giving to the community which saved her from one of the French civil wars. The rest of the community is apprehensive of her foreign feast at best and downright convinced it will be diabolical at worst.

If a feast prepared for twelve people, who don’t fully understand what the feast is, and yet it transforms them as they consume it sounds familiar to a staple of Christian theology, it’s because in Gabriel Axel’s film adaptation of Karen Blixen’s short story, Babette’s feast is a metaphor for the Eucharist. That naturally makes Babette herself a Christ figure.

Many great films about religion and spirituality contain Christ figures—Ordet, Andrei Rublev, The Seventh Seal, and more. Almost all of those films involve a Christ figure who suffers in some way for the salvation of themselves or others. What makes Babette a unique Christ figure is not that she doesn’t suffer (losing one’s husband and son in a civil war certainly is suffering), but her similarity to Christ is in the joy and grace she brings others by offering a gift of her talents, which costs her everything she has, but brings peace to a community and to herself.

It’s the portrayal of that peace and joy that makes this film a masterpiece. Every shot of the feast and its preparation are mouthwatering, the Jutland coast is beautiful, each interaction among the small community is filmed with a familiar intimacy. The ways that Babette’s presence challenges and enriches that familiarity shows the spiritual growth that any great art should induce. In a community that had become complacent in their faith and daily routines, it was suspicious, discomforting art from an outsider that challenged them to grow. Again, the growth is subtle, but the subtlety makes the transformation all the more remarkable.

What’s even more remarkable is the one guest to realize the true value of Babette’s feast. None of the pious Puritans who know her appreciate her cooking beyond it being “a very nice meal.” But the worldly General Löwenhielm (Jarl Kulle) who has lived his life with doubt and uncertainty that he chose the right path is able to recognize the extraordinary quality of the feast. Once again, great art can work its inspiration anywhere and often not where our preconceived notions tell us it should be.

In Blixen’s short story, Babette explains to Martine and Filippa that she had to cook the feast for her own sake, as a great artist. This is less explicit in the film, in keeping with its style, but Babette’s final lines are the same in both versions: “Through all the world there goes one long cry from the heart of the artist: ‘Give me leave to do my utmost.’” That utmost is a partaking in the divine act of creation, to quote John Paul II’s letter to artists, and whether the recipients of that art realize it or not, it incites a change. It incites a change in the entire Jutland community, and as the general proclaims at the end of the meal, “Mercy and truth have met together. Righteousness and bliss have kissed.”

Personal recommendation: A+

Lourdes

Originally published as part of the A&F Top 100

Year of release: 2009     Directed by Jessica Hausner.      Starring Sylvie Testud, Léa Seydoux, Bruno Todeschini, and Elina Löwensohn.

A Catholic pilgrimage underscored by a Lutheran chorale, a nun abandoning her duties to have an affair, a skeptic receiving a miraculous cure ahead of more devout pilgrims. A cliché I can’t stand says “God moves in mysterious ways,” and while it is possible to take that away from Jessica Hausner’s Lourdes, I think what’s more striking are the paradoxes within which grace can work.

For anyone who doesn’t know, the grotto in Lourdes, France is a very famous Catholic pilgrimage site where Mary appeared to Bernadette Soubirous when she was fourteen, revealing a hidden spring with healing powers. Once the vision was approved by the Church, it quickly became a popular pilgrimage site.

Christine (Sylvie Testud), the paraplegic skeptic, expresses disappointment in how touristy the grotto has become, but is still grateful for the chance to travel somewhere. Maria (Léa Seydoux), the young nun assigned to be her caretaker, is glad she is mostly enjoying it and dutifully stays by her side.

One of the best aspects of Lourdes is how much of it is left to the viewer’s interpretation. The film is in no way a sermon, and whether Christine receives a miraculous cure is debatable. Jessica Hausner sets the scenes and allows each viewer and character to conclude what they will. It’s not that different from the evidence for belief in God: we can look at events of the world and see them as proof of His existence or not. And because it’s so personal, those who choose one view will probably not persuade those who choose the other.

The opening shot of the movie is the nuns setting the course for dinner, underscored by Schubert’s Ave Maria. It’s an example of Hausner’s unobtrusive observation of literally setting a scene, but during that dinner we’re reminded that the pilgrimage is an opportunity offered to the pilgrims for the grace to change spiritually, even if they’re not healed physically.

The most notable thing about Mary’s appearance to Bernadette in 1858 is that she identified herself as the Immaculate Conception. In Catholic theology, this preservation from original sin made her the perfect vessel of grace to serve as a mediator between God and humankind by carrying the New Covenant (Jesus) in a virgin birth. That is an entire series of paradoxes, but they’re all ones which bring grace to a fallen world. In Lourdes, it is the seeming contradictions through which grace and change occur within the characters.

Perhaps the biggest paradox is that the skeptic Christine appears to receive a miraculous cure, or a nun having an affair provides an opportunity to witness that cure, or the tradition to award the “best pilgrim” is based on outward appearances. Obviously, none of those things can be known for certain, and it is in that uncertainty that grace can flourish and Hausner’s directing excels.

It is worth noting that Seydoux’s nun is named Maria, and her charge is named Christine (Christ + ine). The relationship between them may initially appear as a mother caring for a child, but once again a skeptical Christ figure who baffles and inspires others and a Marian figure who abandons her child during her transformation (or passion) are a series of paradoxes that make the grace being offered to the characters stand out all the more.

The prominent use of Bach’s Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ (I call on you, Lord Jesus Christ) as underscoring is remarkable, not only for it being a German Lutheran chorale used during a French Catholic Marian pilgrimage, but as a reminder that most of the pilgrims are calling on God for a cure to some ailment, which makes it all the more mysterious that the one who does not do so apparently receives it.

I said I dislike the phrase, “God moves in mysterious ways,” and that is because it is so often used to minimalize some tragedy or severe disappointment, as if to suggest that God willed evil. There is obviously some truth in the phrase, because as St. Augustine said, “If you can comprehend, it is not God.” That is the truth Lourdes hauntingly explores. As the final shot makes clear, we and the characters will not know precisely what happened to Christine, and each interpretation will only be influenced by the faith that one possesses.