Bille August illustrates in ‘The Pact’ the almost vampire relationship of the writer of ‘Out of Africa’ with a poet 30 years younger than her. “The devil promised her that everything she experienced would be a novel,” says the Danish director
The name of Karen Blixen (1885-1962) adopts in our memory the face of Meryl Streep in ‘Out of Africa’. The seventeen years that she spent in Kenya marked the life of the Danish writer, who signed a large part of her works as Isak Dinesen. However, the bulk of her literature was conceived in the family home in Rungstedlund, a few kilometers north of Copenhagen, today a museum that preserves all her memories intact and in whose gardens is her grave next to a be centenarian
Blixen is a national glory in Denmark, but also a complex woman who became a celebrity after her African adventure. She treated myths like Marilyn Monroe, she lived through economic ruin and in her last years she suffered a physical degradation marked by syphilis, which was infected by her husband in Kenya. Nothing illustrates her dark side as well as her story with the poet Thorkild Bjørnvig (1918-2004), whom she met when he was 29 and she was 62. Blixen opened the doors of literature to her, but in return kept him locked up in Rungstedlund for almost two years.
Jørgen Stormgaard, who wrote ‘Blixen and Bjørnvig. The pact was broken’, describes a relationship of mutual dependence, Mephistophelean, “between poet and muse, but also between mistress and servant”. His book is now a movie, which hits theaters on January 28 and has caused a tremendous controversy in Denmark, making the works of Blixen and Bjørnvig top the sales charts. Bille August, winner of an Oscar and two Palmes d’Or, acknowledges that he had always been fascinated by a writer who conceived her life as a work. “She maintained that she made a pact with the devil because of syphilis,” the director tells EL CORREO. “The devil promises her that everything she experiences will be a novel. I find it fascinating that she was always trying to manipulate the people around her into inspiring her.”
Married with a young son, Thorkild Bjørnvig (Simon Bennebjerg) is a gifted writer and handsome man, but Blixen (Birthe Neumann) knows she can’t sleep with him because of his illness. The author of ‘Out of Africa’ shows him an exciting world of success with which she will say goodbye to his economic hardship. She invites him to live intensely and focus on his writing, to travel to other places and even to commit adultery to leave behind a family life that, according to Blixen, castrates creation.
Karen Blixen and Thorkild Bjørnvig at the family home in Rungstedlund.
“You can be a better writer if you have had experiences in life,” reflects the director of ‘Pelle, the conqueror’, ‘The best intentions’ and ‘The house of the spirits’. “But that doesn’t mean you have to be unfaithful or cheat on anyone. Karen Blixen hated marriage, for her it was a damaging, devastating element. She even suggested that Thornkild’s wife commit suicide, something that happened, but luckily it didn’t work out ». ‘The Pact’ wonders if a happy father of a family can be an artist or if it takes someone tortured to extract truth from creation. “I know great artists who are calm people, who love their family and their home,” says Bille August, who was a friend and disciple of Ingmar Bergman, “a tortured man, constant self-flagellation.” “It helps if you know how to play all the keys on the piano when portraying the characters.”
«I know great artists who are calm people, who love their family. Bergman, on the other hand, was a tortured man, constant self-flagellation»
“I think people still want to go to the movies. You enter a room, you sit in the armchair, the darkness surrounds you and suddenly you are a child again»
Although she is described as a “witch”, the director maintains that Karen Blixen would not dislike the film’s portrayal of her. She «she gave many parties at her house, and when she dressed up she did it as a witch. She never foresaw the consequences of her wish. Because of these maneuvers she lost Thornkild and her whole world collapsed ». At 73, the father of eight children by five different women, Bille August has six films in the pipeline, including a Gianni Versace biopic. The Oscar for ‘Pelle, the conqueror’ in 1988, he admits, flooded him with offers. “Suddenly, I was an international director. But I have always seen Hollywood as something superficial. Many European directors go there and the result is very sad, because they eat them.
The director Bille August in Madrid. /
The author of ‘Les miserables’ and ‘Smila, mystery in the snow’ never looks back. “I’m only interested in the next project,” says the filmmaker, who is preparing ‘Ehrengard’ with Netflix, an adaptation of a posthumous story by Karen Blixen. “The pandemic was an opportunity for streaming platforms to take over the market,” he admits. “But I think people still want to go to the movies. You walk into a room, you sit in the chair, darkness envelops you and suddenly you are a child again.
August laments that the big studios “are only interested in Marvel superheroes.” Netflix and other platforms instead opt for an intimate cinema. “Some of the Oscar-nominated movies this year will be produced by Netflix, because the studios just don’t bother to finance them,” he says. “For me the future will be that these films are released first in theaters and then online.”
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