Maybe it’s a little
soon to say this, but Babette’s Feast is the best movie I’ve seen this year.
I don’t want to over
sell it, but there’s a reason most people never heard of this movie.
It’s a Danish film
with little action and a powerful message that goes directly against everything
modern man believes and pursues.
And yet… the
photography is stunning, the dialogues are moving and certain scenes are
amazingly simple and philosophical. The characters are role models who would
put George Bailey to shame.
Actually, Babette’s
Feast seems to pick up where It’s a wonderful life left off. Both deal with the
beauty (and the dullness) of everyday, ordinary life but whereas George Bailey constantly sacrifices himself for his family, the three main characters in Babette’s Feast
sacrifice themselves for God and their fellow human beings.
Babette is a French
refugee who lives with two elderly women, Filippa and Martine, in a small
Scandinavian town. The three live very simple, humble lives: Babette working as a maid/cook and the two women helping the elderly, the poor and the sick of the village.
Problems arise when
Babette, a Catholic, offers to make a typical French dinner in celebration of the birthday
of Martine and Filippa’s father. The two sisters, strict Protestants, view the
French dinner with utter horror and an occasion for sin and vice. Will they be
charitable and allow Babette to go on with her luxurious French dinner?
The background
stories of the two sisters are very interesting and their attitudes towards the
pursuit of marriage and carrier are shocking to modern eyes.
It is noteworthy
that it was said that they live “impoverished lives". For our Age, where the
pursuit of all interests other than our own has been dismissed, yes, their lives are boring. But for the characters
themselves and those who share their Christian worldview, they live very rich
lives.
I won’t say more
about the story because I don’t want to spoil the movie’s beautiful surprises,
but watching this movie now is just so refreshing.
The last time I went
to the movies I saw 5 trailers that dealt, one way or another, with the destruction of the world as we know it.
Five.
These movies, with fitting names such as After Earth, Oblivion, Escape from Planet Earth (can you guess which one is a children's movie?) had a lot in common. All portrayed more or less apocalyptic
scenarios where Earth or part of it is destroyed and people are left alone to fight for survival, their futures bleak and not promising.
Funny how these movies are far from the reality of (relative) peace and prosperity in the Western world. So, where does this need to watch bleakness and despair come from? What is it
mirroring? Since it doesn’t mirror the outward reality, it must be expressing
our inner reality.
The question is: do these movies offer a sense of meaning or belonging in the end? Or are they fueling our dissatisfaction with violence
and destruction, deepening an inner void?
Think of The Hunger Games. The main character offers to die for others, which is a much bigger and
courageous sacrifice than the ones in Babette’s Feast or It’s a Wonderful life. But the presence of action, violence and competition in the movie end up glamorizing this sacrifice.
What Babette,
Martina, Fillipa (and George Bailey) do is not glamorous at all.
But what is more readily available: to give away your life or to eat a coarse, unseasoned soup without complaining like Babette does?
Babette’s Feast reminds us
that our lives, no matter how much they are filled with seemingly ordinary, repetitive actions, can be very meaningful and rich.
That's something we easily forget, specially with so many movies teaching us otherwise. Which is why I wish more people would watch and learn to appreciate Babette’s Feast.
I’d say that very
soon, movies like this and It’s a wonderful life will be considered outdated.
I consider them counter-culture.
Have you seen Babette's Feast or It's a Wonderful Life? What do you think of these new movie releases?
