Essay On Babette's Feast

In the movie, Babette’s Feast, we learn of two sisters, Filippa and Martine, who are caring for the aging congregation left behind by their father, the pastor played by Pouel Kern who had died. The movie opens with Babette, played by Stephane Audran serving a meal to the sisters and their guests. It then flashes back to a time when the sisters were young women. They were both beautiful women and men came to try to court them. Their father would turn away any would be suitor. He eschewed marriage, seemingly for the purpose of keeping the girls close to him and therefore the sisters became spinsters. Whereas both of them had opportunities to have relationships with men, they rebuffed their suitors and remained with their father.
The father’s power over the sisters was evidenced by their utter devotion to him.
Transformation can be redemptive when we discover truth. (Janssen, 108). It is redemptive when it creates whole people. The congregation in the movie, were a shadow of the pastor. They were a closed community which was dying. They did the same monotonous processes day after day. There were no children in the community. Babette was an indication of transformation that was bringing life to that dying community. We saw during the feast, one teenager, which also could be a sign of hope for the community. If transformation is to take place, there must be trust. The sisters did not trust Babette had their best interest in mind when she offered to prepare the celebratory meal in honor of their father. They told the congregation that they would eat the meal in silence. Things changed when General Lorens Lowenhielm, played by Jarl Kulle, who didn’t know of the pact, began to describe the wonderful meal. Even after hearing about the exquisite meal, I wonder why the sisters did not invite Babette to the dining room to celebrate her for what she had done. Transformation for the sisters still had not taken