It has only the vaguest relationship to the life of Isak Dinesen, but that’s hardly the point in this kind of lush romantic filmmaking (1985). Sydney Pollack applies craftsmanship and restraint to a classic plot curve of longing, fulfillment, and loss, and although the denouement is a bit overextended, he never yields to facile, insistent sentimentality—his effects are honestly won. Pollack may be the only remaining American filmmaker who knows how to get his money’s worth out of movie stars: his handling of Robert Redford brings out his iconographic power without insisting overmuch on the “golden boy” mythology that often clogs up his appearances; his refusal to worship Meryl Streep’s accent mongering makes her performance, though as mannered as usual, seem surprisingly accessible and uncalculated. A few rough transitions and a curiously slapdash opening sequence (which finds Streep and costar Klaus Maria Brandauer optically printed into some Danish locations) suggest some last-minute structural tinkering, but ultimately this is a film of rare and pleasing smoothness—Hollywood as it was meant to be. With Michael Gough and Suzanna Hamilton.