Maria Grace, Ph.D.

Reflection Paper on the Film “Babette’s Feast”

Set in a small fishing village along the coast of Denmark (Kierkegaard’s birth

country), and based on Danish author Isak Dinesen’s short story, the film “Babette’s Feast”

is a religious poem in images, a visual narrative of the healing effects of the Eucharistic

meal on the participants, and a faithful depiction of the Lutheran theology of Grace.

The story is simple: A small Pietist community on the coast of Denmark lives its life

in the late 1800s under the strict guidance of its pastor who, aided by his two devoted

daughters (Martina and Philippa) ensures that everyone’s faith is demonstrated by good

works. Adherence to pious living prohibits outsiders to intrude upon the morals of the

community and attempt to introduce changes. Life remains the same until Babette, a French

woman, arrives unexpectedly at the Pastor’s house and offers her services for free to

Pastor’s unmarried daughters, years after their father’s death. On their father’s 100 birth

anniversary, Babette prepares a feast that heals and restores the community. To prepare

the feast, Babette has paid with the 10,000 francs she has won in the lottery.

1. Symbolism in the film:

Highly symbolic, the film uses sound, color, music, word, actions and things to create

a context of Lutheran orthodoxy, in which Christ will be present to forgive, to heal, to make

old creatures anew.

a. The meal: The main dish, cailles au sarcophage means quail in sarcophagus,

makes reference both to God's miraculous feeding of the Israelites in the desert (a

foreshadowing of the Eucharist) and to the three days Christ spent in the tomb after his

redemptive sacrifice (memorialized in the Eucharist). Additionally, “sarcophage” originates

from the Greek σαρκοφάγος, a word comprising of σάρξ (= flesh) and φαγείν (= to eat).

The word of the dish itself evokes the eating of the flesh of Christ. The abundant wine that

keeps pouring at the meal makes reference to Christ’s blood that redeems and saves.

b. Babette: Her French origins and her jeweled cross, also the fact that she is sent

to serve by the French Opera Singer Achille Papin make reference to the Roman Church.

Her role in this eucharistic feast is perhaps closer to that of the Roman priest than that of

the Lutheran pastor—there are allusions to Roman Catholic Mass, such as the “sacrifice” of

the quails by Babette, and then, after the meal, there is subtle reference to the rubrics of

the Mass: Babette is at one point shown drinking up the remains of the wine, as if

consuming the remnants of the sacramental elements. In another scene, she is washing her
 Maria Grace, Ph.D.
Reflection Paper on the Film “Babette’s Feast”
hands in a kind of post-communion purification ritual. But her presence during the meal is a

reference to Christ. Babette has sacrificed everything she won in her lottery ticket to pay for

the feast. Babette, as the giver of grace through her art, is a parallel to Christ who gives

himself through the Eucharist, with all that it entails of the gifts of unity and forgiveness.

c. The Meal participants: Their number is twelve, as in the Lord’s Supper. Parallel

to Christ's self-giving in the Lord's Supper is the self-giving of the partakers in communion,

the fellowship and mutual aid of the Christian community. Their union with God and the

saints, a result of the forgiveness of sins, is brought about in the Eucharist and results in

mutual forgiveness of mutual grievances.

Prior to the feast, the community had for years been immersed in Pietist living, in

which adherence to good works had taken the place of healing Grace, but could not produce

the effects of Grace. The fruits of Christ’s Spirit as he comes in the sacraments, faith, hope

and love were lacking. The community gathered in “babbling and bellowing” the word, but

they were not partaking of the “beneficium” of sacrament. As a result, the community

suffered from tension, strife, and discord. Forgiveness and unity was lacking.

2. The Eucharistic meal as embodying God’s judgment and mercy

The film presents Martina’s dream sequence about the upcoming feast, in which the

beckoning woman (Babette), the monster turtle, the fire, and the spilled wine seem to

allude to terrible violence and death. Terror is felt as the sisters prepare to participate in the

feast, which is also reflected by the dark, gray and blue color tones of the film. As the

dinner itself nears, the increasing warmth of the color scheme parallels and symbolizes the

diners' correspondence to the grace poured out upon the participants. As they "feel their

hearts strangely warmed," the film's colors warm.

For Luther, the effectiveness of the sacrament does not lie in the miraculous

transubstantiation of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, but in the

participants' eating of it in faith that Christ is present. In eating, the participant becomes a

partaker in Christ and in the communion of saints. The principal effect upon the

communicant is the forgiveness of sin. By this sacrament all self-seeking love of the old

creature is killed, and love of the other in the new creature is born. This love seeks the

common good of all, and through this mutual love there is one bread, one drink, one body,
 Maria Grace, Ph.D.
Reflection Paper on the Film “Babette’s Feast”
one community. The sacrament, received in faith, gives the faithful entrance into eternal

life.

3. Healing and Mercy through the Meal—The General’s speech

According to Luther, it is grace that saves the faithful, principally grace as it is

granted through the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the Eucharist. The General, in contrast

to the brethren, can recognize the quality of Babette's art, he has the most profound

conversion of all. In his speech on the nature of grace, in which he cites Psalm 85, he finds

and realizes the truth of the old religious commonplaces he has been using to his own

advantage (a reference is the scene in which he quotes a psalm as he dances with nobility,

to advance his status). He alone recognizes the abundance of Babette's (i.e., Christ’s)

outpouring, both its quality and, when he asks whether there is any more Clos Vougeot and

to his bewilderment is given the rest of the bottle, its sheer quantity. Through this abundant

pouring out of grace, the General is reunited in blessed communion with Martine, and not

only are his sins forgiven, but even his old bad choices are made good, transformed by

grace. His own strengthening against death resounds in his final phrase to Martine: "I shall

be with you every day that is left to me."

4. The juxtapositions of sacred/profane

The meal itself, the actions of its participants and its effects on them are a series of

juxtapositions of the sacred and the profane. The Pietists reject worldly illusions for an

ascetic religious life, but find real religious experience in Babette's very earthly food and

drink. In their meal, the sacred is always juxtaposed to the profane: The talk at dinner is all

pious clichés while the eating and drinking are comically and innocently gluttonous. The one

old lady's disappointment when a glass of water turns out to be in fact, water, and not

another new and exciting treat, is a marvel. The General sets out to justify his worldly

success and finds his heart has truly been with Martine in Jutland all along. He expects to

dominate the dinner party in his dashing uniform, and instead finds himself overwhelmed by

it. He wishes at last to speak with force and vigor in the dean's house, as he never could as

a young man, and finds, as he speaks, that he hardly knows what he is saying, and is

carried along apparently by inspiration. Papin, when he writes to Philippa, imagines that she

has rightly renounced her career for marriage and a happy family. Instead, she has led a
 Maria Grace, Ph.D.
Reflection Paper on the Film “Babette’s Feast”
lonely life. He, whose career has brought him the fame he sought for her, is as alone as

she, and imagines she has chosen the happier part. The two sisters, in taking Babette in our

of charity, find themselves recipients of the far greater gifts of charity and the outpouring of

her grace. They have renounced love, but it is returned to them a hundredfold.

5. Otherness as a revelation of Christ

This community was lead into a deeper reality by Babette who, as mentioned above,

represents the Papist church. The contrast between the Papist roots of Babette and the

“death and rebirth” into life experienced by this Lutheran community is astounding. The

“otherness” in Babette’s culture broke the central symbols of the meal and caused the

outpouring of Grace that brought new life to the participants. This is also a reference to

Luther’s theology of the Cross, in which Christ is hidden—and revealed--in Christ’s opposite.

Christ came to the people of that community through a person/church representative that

was their opposite.

6. Healing and “sending” after the meal

At the end of the dinner, as the guests leave, their sins are forgiven and their

sorrows are healed. They join hands in the starlight and dance in a ring around the village

well, in a highly symbolic scene. The simplest and most familiar objects and the most

ordinary and mundane gesture (the joining of hands) take on a power of suggested

meaning, where the natural and the supernatural meet before our eyes. The well—that

refers to baptism—speaks of Christ, and the stars above speak of the heavenly realm. The

ring dance suggests that its participants have touched eternity (the ring has no beginning

and no end) in the presence of grace. The snowflakes are an reference to manna that fell

from the sky—as Grace. They have consumed the meal, which are the quails. The scene

points to John's gospel in which Jesus appropriates that piece of Israel's wilderness history

and then trumps it with his own "I am the Bread of Life." (6:35). John 6 is the Eucharist

chapter in John's Gospel. He has no Maundy Thursday passover meal in his passion

narrative.

Everyone's response to the dinner is a form of correspondence to the sacramental

grace of the eucharistic feast, with all of its consequences. The participants are in fact not

fully able to appreciate Babette's cooking beyond the most rudimentary level, as she must
 Maria Grace, Ph.D.
Reflection Paper on the Film “Babette’s Feast”
know. Still, she gives it to them, regardless of their ability to correspond to it, just as God

gives grace. The meal's effect on them is threefold: they are drawn together back into the

fellowship that they had lost, they forgive each other their sins and are forgiven, and as

they draw near to the end of their lives, they recognize the diminishing of death's

significance in the face of eternity.