For many years, turning forty sounded something of a death knell for the careers of many actresses in Hollywood. Often relegated to the background as sexless and thinly sketched archetypes of motherhood, few could hope to sink their teeth into the same kind of meaty, complex parts as their male peers. Recently, however, the tide seems to have turned in their favour, treating audiences to a panoply of incredible performances from the likes of Demi Moore (The Substance), Pamela Anderson (The Last Showgirl), and Amy Adams (Nightbitch). It is a joy to see Nicole Kidman join their ranks in this sophomore effort from director Halina Reijn (Bodies, Bodies, Bodies), channeling the same fearlessness and audacious talent that first propelled her stardom.
Romy Mathis (Kidman), the CEO of a somewhat vaguely realized robotics company, appears to possess all the outward trappings of modern-day success: a handsome theatre director husband (Antonio Banderas), two lovely and self-possessed daughters (Esther Rose McGregor and Vaughan Reilly), and well-appointed homes in both the city and the country. She is respected in the workplace, loved at home, and predictably – as the cinematic trope must go – desperately dissatisfied and simmering with unrealized desire.
Enter Samuel (Harris Dickinson). Romy first spots him as he confidently calms a violent dog in the street outside her office, and is immediately intrigued by his calm bravado. Unexpectedly, he shows up again amongst the fresh crop of interns touring her office, and upon their introduction surprises her with his uncowed assertiveness, skeptically confronting her about the company mission statement she’s been parroting as they prepare for an important new launch. Romy is rattled, but finds herself increasingly drawn to him, and reading her desire, he quickly pushes the boundaries of their relationship further and further.
Where most films about dominant/submissive dynamics tend to cast the dominant party as suave and unfailingly in control of a wilting and instantly yielding submissive, Babygirl takes a more nuanced view of the power dynamics between two characters completely unsure of how to navigate a kind of relationship they both desire, but have never before explored. It is fascinating (and often funny) to watch the pair make things up as they go along, clumsily navigating how to wield and yield the power each holds over the other, and many of their most intimate scenes are punctuated with uncomfortable, incredulous laughter.
Dickinson is an interesting choice of leading man, and holds his own against the more experienced Kidman, ably projecting Samuel’s easy confidence, but also the ghostly bemusement simmering beneath the surface. While Romy, through this liaison, seems to be allowing herself access to her true nature for the first time, at times it seems Samuel may simply be trying on this persona for a brief time, and ready to let it go once the relationship runs its course.
Unfortunately, the inevitable unraveling of their relationship is less interesting than its inception, and full of predictable revelations and manipulations that do little to deepen the emotional truth of the film. Less developed characters, such as Romy’s husband Jacob (Banderas) and her ambitious young assistant Esme (Sophie Wilde), sweep dramatically into the film’s final act in an attempt to stitch the events of the film into a tidy package of sentiments about marriage, morality, and ambition, but it all feels an unfittingly sterile ending for a story that promised such tantalizing emotional complexity. It is somewhat puzzling to consider Romy’s breakdown of the true nature of her darkest desire – her need to be risking the loss of something truly important – because in the end, nothing much seems to have been risked at all.
Perhaps the film’s greatest flaw is that it fails to develop its central characters more deeply. We learn next to nothing about Samuel, and as for Romy, despite a casual mention of her being raised in a cult (!) and periodic flashes of EMDR therapy, Reijn declines to dig any further into the surely fascinating backstory of a woman who somehow went on to graduate from Yale with distinction despite such traumatic beginnings. Alas, we shall all have to live with the enduring mystery.
Babygirl is currently screening in cinemas across North America.
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