“Babygirl” Review
Nicole Kidman (Left) and Harris Dickinson craft an enticing and suspenseful affair in the erotic thriller “Babygirl”.
After an outstanding job directing “Bodies Bodies Bodies”, Dutch filmmaker Halina Reijn returns to American audiences with another film distributed by A24: “Babygirl”. Like “Bodies Bodies Bodies”, “Babygirl” feels very familiar with its basic premise, but the overall execution is far more intriguing and warrants much attention and praise. Featuring one of Nicole Kidman’s finest performances and an erotic atmosphere of doubt and deception, “Babygirl” is quite the venture from a superb director.
Romy Mathis (Nicole Kidman) is a successful CEO of an innovative tech company but proves that money isn’t a cure-all. Her biggest problem is that, despite loving her husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas), she is dissatisfied with their sex life and the growing stresses of work aren’t making things any better. But when she is assigned to mentor an intern named Samuel (Harris Dickinson), Romy is put off by Samuel’s dominant nature that quickly becomes inappropriate when he starts making advances towards her. However, Romy finds that this behavior has awakened something in her and engages in an affair with Samuel which leads to a complex game of mental chess between the two as the power dynamic in their work and personal lives becomes increasingly tangled.
In Halina Reijn’s script, she creates an interesting web that doesn’t offer any black-and-white with its characters. With Romy, it could be easy to point the finger at her actions and decry them for being wrong and putting her marriage at risk but Romy is aware of this. Kidman adds so much dimension to the role because you understand why she would be attracted to this compromising scenario even though half the time she doesn’t even look like she wants to be there. However, it’s not a character inconsistency, it’s a vivid struggle of desire and morality and where the two meet and separate. While competing for the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, Kidman won the Volpi Cup for Best Actress and it’s easy to see why thanks to Kidman’s excellent complexity.
Harris Dickinson manages a strong balancing act going from charming to intimidating in a second as “Babygirl” asks “who’s in charge?” The entire film is full of a strong sense of excitement because of how “Babygirl” plays with this dynamic and Dickinson’s magnetism combined with Kidman and her internal conflict about how much control to give up makes for an uneasy and captivating two hours.
Other supporting players like Antonio Banderas add dimension to the film by showing how reassuring but safe Romy’s existence is and why she would secretly crave that danger, especially since there’s already a noticeable void in her life that is gnawing at her. Also welcome is the performance of Sophie Wilde as Romy’s assistant who looks up to her boss and is trying to follow in Romy’s footsteps by showcasing initiatives to help women succeed in the workplace, presenting an idealism that Romy once probably had. After marveling at Wilde’s performance last year in “Talk To Me”, it was fantastic to see her in a new film from A24.
During the scenes that rely on absolute intimacy, Halina Reijn brings the same versatility she displayed in “Bodies Bodies Bodies”. Reijn and Jasper Wolf, who worked with Reijn on “Bodies Bodies Bodies” craft a contained atmosphere while Kidman and Dickinson really sell this relationship with every scene unlocking a new side of these characters. Always playing with expectations, “Babygirl” is anything but predictable and the entire running time sparked curiosity as to how all of this is going to end. What is the fallout of such a relationship and is it going to change the characters for better or for worse?
What “Babygirl” is trying to do is to manipulate the dynamics of a relationship, especially one that is working in the taboo. With such a daring premise, it could be too easy to fall into convention. But that's not what this film is about. “Babygirl” is an intensely gripping thriller that looks at our own desires and the shocking events that occur when they are denied or not even discussed openly. It’s a fine line between smartly sensual and exploitative with this kind of erotic thriller and “Babygirl” manages to be on the right side of that line the whole way through.
