The latest from Oscar and Palme d’Or-winning director Bille August takes on his compatriot, legendary Danish writer Karen Blixen (aka Isak Dinesen). But this isn’t the lively, laughing Karen of the Out of Africa days, this is the sixty-something, terribly ill Baroness in her twilight years, living a carefully controlled existence at her family’s coastal estate north of Copenhagen. Still charismatic and maintaining her image as a literary genius, she delights in manipulating the lives of her younger writer friends. The Pact is based on a book by Thorkild Bjørnvig, who, as a talented 30-year-old poet suffering from writer’s block, was offered a Faustian bargain by Blixen. She promises him literary stardom if he will obey her unconditionally, to the point of renouncing his family. Under her wing, he finds that his words begin to flow, but his librarian wife and young son wind up paying the price. Winner, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actress, Beijing.
Director Biography
Billie August’s film Pelle the Conqueror (1987) won the Palme dOr at the Cannes Film Festival and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. His features include The Best Intentions (1992) which also won the Palme d’Or, The House of the Spirits (1993), and A Fortunate Man (2018) among many others.