Culture has been having an anti-girlboss moment. “Girl” as an adjective-noun is not in the vein of “girl power” but as a signifier of things flighty and childish. “Girl” describes your math, your dinner, your failures. “Treats” and “trinkets” as a way to heal your inner child and hone your aesthetic sense, seemingly swimming in endless $5-$20 transactions. Women are tired of the liberal feminist ideal of high-achieving perfection and smashing the patriarchy, and now parade their desires to simply be (whatever that form of being is). At the heart of Halina Reijn’s Babygirl is a similar sensibility, albeit angling for a more sexual theme that most grown girls seem to shun.
Romy (Nicole Kidman, adding another holiday-ish dissatisfied wife erotica to her repertoire next to Eyes Wide Shut) and Jacob (Antonio Banderas, who, amusingly, has been the deliciously toxic younger man himself in age gap erotica Law of Desire) seemingly have the perfect marriage, but from the very first scene, we see the cracks. Romy looks disgusted when Jacob tells her “I love you” after sex, and goes off to search for DDLG porn to get off immediately after he’s finished. To her, these age-regressing submission fantasies are unbecoming of a CEO, especially a female CEO, so she bottles it all up, settling for nineteen years without an orgasm instead. Things change when the insolent intern Samuel (Harris Dickinson) enters the picture, and she begins to secretly pursue a sadomasochistic relationship with him.
Babygirl is something of a cross between erotic thriller and comedy of manners, and many of the sex scenes have an awkwardness about them that contrasts with the salacious nature of the film’s subject matter. Romy’s relationship with Samuel is like a funhouse mirror of power dynamics, where the younger man has power over the older woman CEO. He reiterates throughout the film that he can take away everything with a single call, but Samuel comes off as dopey (not unlike her husband) when he tries to play the role of the domineering rogue. The difference is that Samuel magically intuited Romy’s inner “darkness,” without her having to say anything, whereas her husband, try as he might, cannot understand why she’s so unhappy.
Romy’s failure to communicate with either of them is part of the fantasy, and I normally don’t mind this type of logic where characters are so tuned into each other that they speak without words (how romantic!). However, the film has many moments that seem to preempt the discourse it invites, breaking the suspension of disbelief. When Romy first shamefully describes her desires to Jacob, he says enacting them makes him “feel like a villain.” This isn’t a problem in itself, and shows the sexual incompatibility of Romy and Jacob. Samuel, however, has grand speeches about consent that are part of his sexual guidance of Romy, even when what we are shown is Romy rejecting his advances until she gives in. And later, when Samuel and Jacob have their little tussle over her, Jacob accuses Romy of abusing Samuel, then the two men begin to philosophize about the origins and ethics of female masochism and consent (and also share a homoerotic panic attack scene). Toeing the line between consent and consensual nonconsent and just plain nonconsent could be fine in a sexy fantasy world… but the men are extremely aware of the story and the current, real world context they’re in, while Romy is stuck in the crossfire. Her naivety in these matters makes her the “girl,” in the “I’m just a girl” sense.
Like The Substance and Challengers, the endless optimization of the female body takes its toll. Though Nicole Kidman doesn’t explode or have a career ending injury, we get glimpses of her deaging routine consisting of botox and cold baths. The mental cost of maintaining her lifestyle is perhaps what brought her to lead an automated shipping company (though the film mostly leaves this as a fun fact about her) as well as her compartmentalization of marriage and sex. Romy’s assistant, a stand-in for clean-cut corporate ideas, is who the film finds truly reprehensible, chastising Romy for not being a good role model because of her cheating and submission fantasies: “I want you to succeed – not as you are now, but as a version of you I can look up to.” The inherently chilling detail of her being a CEO, as well as the company’s ironic goal of “giving people their time back” through automation, and even her usage of porn are all uncriticized. Instead of analyzing these various facets of female sexuality and expression, we are left with rather trite messaging on the importance of being yourself, even when it goes against corporate.
These confusing politics would be fine and well – welcome, even – if it at least delivered on its erotic thriller sensibilities. “Something has to be at stake,” as Romy said. But erotic thrillers rely on fantasy and improbability, and Babygirl reminds us of reality in ways that undermine it. Just as these aforementioned stakes are reaching a head, the resolution happens off screen. Jacob suddenly knows how to perform as a dom and Samuel has left the company for Tokyo. Romy holds these two men in her heart during sex with Jacob, and Jacob is fine with this, and their family isn’t falling apart anymore. The consequences for Romy are apparently nonexistent, due to the inherent virtue of exploring her sexuality. Conjuring Samuel’s image, she is rewarded with her first orgasm with Jacob in nineteen years. This is what true girl power looks like.
