Euronews Culture's Film of the Week: 'Babygirl' - Nicole Kidman shines in sex-positive BDSM drama

Romy (Nicole Kidman) has got it all. She is a high-powered tech-executive with a doting husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas) and two teenage daughters (Esther McGregor and Vaughan Reilly). 

Things aren't that simple though. The fact that she heads up a company specialized in robotics and that her husband is a theatre director should tell you that she knows a thing or two about living life in automation mode and excels when it comes to nailing a performance when she needs to. We learn this in the first scenes of Babygirl, when Romy is sexually going through the motions and needs to head to her laptop for some sub-dom porn once she’s had a seemingly intense orgasm with her husband.

She begins an affair with Samuel (Harris Dickinson), one of her new, younger interns who she previously clocked in the street taming a dog who was about to launch itself at her. He recognises she is aroused by submissive role play, and she’s immediately drawn to his assertiveness, as well as his disregard for office niceties. As their BDSM-tinged relationship develops, so do the threat levels. 

Is Romy finally getting to explore sexual terrains she has previously denied herself, putting her on the way to sexual fulfilment? Or is she being used by a predatory man who could torpedo everything she has built at the drop of hat?   

As Samuel casually points out: “I could make one call and you could lose everything.” 

But that could be the biggest turn on of all... And she seems to realize it. When her husband asks her if he is relevant to her as a director, she replies: “We are all irrelevant – we need to pay more attention to the avalanche that’s going to cover us very soon.” 

Prescient words, as an avalanche is coming. 

To describe Babygirl a transgressive erotic drama might be doing it a disservice. While it is erotic, those looking for a sleazy kink fest will be disappointed, as this Dangerous Liaison is more concerned with desire and the act of consent rather than easy titillation.

Dutch actor-turned-filmmaker Halina Reijn, who previously directed 2022’s Bodies Bodies Bodies and 2019's Instinct, which centred on a psychosexual relationship between a sex offender and his therapist, shows once again that she can delve into complex desires with brio. With Babygirl, she crafts a late-stage coming-of-age tale that deals with self-discovery and focuses on a woman’s vulnerability, shame, rage, and how she deals with slanted power dynamics. Reijn shines not only in the way she explores how “shameful” desires need their space - and how their suppression can be just as potentially dangerous as an affair – but also in her lack of easy moral judgement.

Instead of bunny boiling and tumbling down the rabbit hole of antiquated standards, she embraces the often-contradictory forces that make people who they are, and never judges or punishes the characters, even when they have to face the consequences of their transgressions. Unlike many 80s and 90s erotic thrillers, there are no good or bad binaries here; just complex people with voracious desires. Which adds to the tantalizing central question: Who is in control? 

As well as its exploration of desire, one key element which makes Babygirl work is humour. 

There are the glass of milk in the bar / saucer of milk in the bedroom scenes that work wonders and will have TikTokers making it their personality for a few weeks; the on-the-nose but excellent needle drops of INXS’ ‘Never Tear Us Apart’ and George Michael’s ‘Father Figure’; and the fact that Jacob is directing a production of Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler” - a play about a woman trapped in a dead-end marriage – wink wink. All make the film surprisingly funny at times, and it takes a stellar cast to toe the line between portraying complex desires and letting loose.

Luckily for Reijn, she got the performers her film needed.  

Nicole Kidman is mesmerizing. Hardly surprising really, as throughout her career, Kidman has never shied away from tough roles and has expertly balanced challenging material (Dogville, Stoker, The Killing of a Sacred Deer) with more commercial fare (Australia, Bewitched) - excelling in both. However, this is one bold role to accept. She imbues Romy with an understated vulnerability and manages to clearly convey her inner turmoil while keeping up appearances. Both her and Harris Dickinson shrewdly play their characters as headstrong but endearingly gauche at times, which makes them all the more relatable. Their double act assures that Babygirl never topples into kinky camp, balancing humour with psychological depth.  

As for Antonio Banderas, he delivers an understated performance that completely matches Kidman’s with significantly less screen time.

What prevents Babygirl from being a true knockout are a handful of niggles, including its tendency to spell things out far too much in the final act. There’s also the strange decision to never have much male nudity.  

While Kidman is frequently – and never exploitatively - nude, we only ever get Dickinson shirtless. Granted, this isn’t about his character’s journey, but to omit Samuel’s nudity does undermine the film’s exploration of gendered power dynamics.  

For all these qualms, Reijn’s third feature remains a bold film considering its candour, casting and performances. Other cinematic touchstones which deal with similar themes like The Piano Teacher, Secretary or Elle may be appropriate (and superior) touchstones, but Reijn excels in hitting at the heart of American puritanism. Babygirl puts certain films that consider themselves to be envelope-pushing in perspective, highlighting how its supposedly taboo-shaking predecessors (9 ½ Weeks, Fifty Shades of Grey) are tame and reductive. Especially in the latter's case and the way it cheaply pathologizes desire. 

Babygirl may 'limit' itself to the sex-positive message that honest and open communication regarding desire is vital, but it’s a crucial and refreshing one many have bypassed. Get your consensual kink on.

Babygirl is out in cinemas now.