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Pastimes : THE ISLAND -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (48)	6/4/2001 9:04:15 AM
From: epicure	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 526

It was NOT deadly boring. It was full of exquisite meaning. Here are these two beautiful girls being raised by their father who is a minister on the wild and remote coast of Jutland. One of them has a voice that could have made her a great opera singer. By chance, Achille Pappin- the great Opera singer- comes to Jutland and hears her singing in the choir. He gives her lessons. He also falls madly in love- with her talent, her beauty and her purity She is tempted to go with him. But she does not go. Is she tempted by what is corrupt about the world? Or is she giving up what would be her greatest happiness? Her sister, a beauty, catches the eye of a young army officer. He visits time after time to sit through the minster's endless sermons. Then he gives up. He decides it would never work out between them. Does he give up to easily? He has a life very different from that he would have had if he'd married this pure country girl. He marries a rich noble woman and lives at court and becomes a great general. Then there is the great Chef. She has to go into hiding because of the French revolution. Her family have all been murdered. She is a friend of Achille Papin- who has grown old- but has never forgotten his love. He sends this woman of the world (a woman of accomplishment, refinement, and goodness also) to this remote village. And what happens then is just magic. I'm not sure I agree that it is good to put off your hopes and dreams in the hope that you will delight the angels with your talents because you couldn't fulfill yourself here on earth (which is what the sisters beleive)- and I think the message in the movies is strongly counter to that- since Babette spends all her earthly money (she wins the French lottery) on putting on a lavish dinner - the kind of dinner she once served when she was chef of the greatest restaurant in France. She does it because her art is more important than anything else, and she lives her art. She lives it every day- making all her meals wonderful- but this meal is a work of art. She doesn't need to delight the angels, she delights people every day- for example the charity people that the ministers daughters bring food to. How they LOVE Babette's cooking. And the magic of that dinner is that it brings out the good in everyone. It brings out generosity of spirit and kindness and love. Babette a Papist sent to the sisters by another Papist, feeding these very strict severe religious stoics the meal of their lives- gives them a kind of religious epiphany. It's really right up the alley of all my philosophical beliefs. Everything comes from us, and from our interactions with each other. We make things into what they are. Even if we don't realize we are doing it.