“Babettes Feast,” the story, written by Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen), and in movie form, was the first Danish film to win an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 1987 (also the year of its release). It is considered by many, if not most who have an opinion, to be the best food-centric movie ever made.

For those not familiar, the plot is fairly simple, and actually one that has been repeated over and over in some guise or another probably since the dawn of filmmaking. The setting is a small village located on the windswept western coast of Jutland during the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871). Two sisters are both very old and very pious, and in their youth, decided to largely forgo any personal ambitions in order to remain with their father, who was the village’s longtime minister. Babette (the amazing Stéphane Audran) arrives in the village from Paris as a refugee from the war, one that was very brief but destructive, hard on soldiers and civilians on both sides, portending the even more destructiveness of the wars that would engulf Europe and much of the world soon enough. She begins work as a housekeeper and cook, preparing perfectly bland meals that are all the sisters want or need—or so they think! Many years later, Babette wins a pretty hefty lottery prize, which she decides to blow on preparing an all-out, bang-up, multi-course meal for the sisters and a few other of the locals. She somehow manages not to let on how much she is spending, nor how decadent the food (and wine) will be, and proceeds.

There are seven courses with matching wines, and each is more resplendent than the last. As is predictable enough, the sisters and others are gradually taken in by the power of taste. After the meal, the sisters assume that Babette will be returning to her beloved Paris, but she informs them that she spent all of the winnings on the meal and will be going nowhere. One of the sisters, truly moved by what has transpired over the course of the evening, laments, “Now you will be poor for the rest of your life,” to which Babette answers, “An artist is never poor.”

Of course, I’m leaving out so much. The parable is an age-old one but it remains compelling. And the kitchen and table scenes are just superb, and excellent from the technical side as well.