Movie Number 6 of 2025
The Movie: Babygirl
The Cinema: Hoyts Victoria Gardens - Preview session
Stars: 3.5
In her role in Babygirl, this is being touted as one of Nicole Kidman's bravest performances. I don't know about that. You see a naked Nicole Kidman on screen, masturbating and generally behaving in an unhinged manner to shaky camera work. Call it what you like. I liked her recent performances better in Bombshell and The Undoing. Although a little more traditional in role and substance, they rang true a lot more.
According to IMDB.com the plot of this reads, "A high-powered CEO puts her career and family on the line when she begins a torrid affair with her much younger intern."
And that is about it.
Kidman plays Romy, an executive in a company that looks a lot like Amazon. Harris Dickinson plays Samuel the intern, who appears to have the power to keep Romy under this thumb. The two meet, Romy is upended by this forthright youth and the two embark on an affair which you cannot quite who holds the power. It's far more complex than something like 50 Shades of Grey, but it lacks the charm of other films that look at these strange dichotomies, such as the ever-marvelous Secretary. Antonio Banderas is a bit lost playing Romy's theatre director husband.
Written and directed by Halina Reijn, it's a fairly run of the mill story. Woman meets boy. Woman has power over boy. Boy gets power over woman. Things look like they're going to blow up. Simples.
And yes, Kidman does a great job of playing an emotionally fragile woman, with too much power, just as Harris Dickinson is very good a Samuel, the possibly unhinged young man who appears to hold the power.
Yet this movie, which is also touted as erotic, risqué and fast-paced let me unsatisfied. I came out asking more questions than answers. There were too many power games in this. Sophi Wilde's Esme, Romy's assistant, was a part of this conundrum. At the end, she came off as cliche.
I did, however, like the music in the film. It has a great soundtrack.
My other big criticism of this was the way the film with shot, which had a hand-held feel which half the time made you feel seasick.
This didn't bowl me over. Although it's had quite a few nominations from the European movie festival circuit, I'm not sure that when an aging actress getting her kit off equates to a brave performance. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with Nicole Kidman's body, or acting. I just think the material could have been better.
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