Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
Are women in power any different than men?
Written and directed by Halina Rejin, Babygirl follows Romy, a successful woman CEO, and her lurid affair with a young intern, which jeopardizes her family life with her husband and two daughters. We’re already used to seeing men in power chasing younger employees, so except for the gender swap, it’s not entirely a new premise. But with stars like Nicole Kidman and Antonio Banderas headlining it, there’s an added zing to the film.
I was excited to watch this, but here’s what immediately frustrated me about Babygirl – Harris Dickinson, who plays Samuel, the young intern Nicole Kidman’s Romy sleeps with, is a total dick from his very first interaction with Romy. In the first few minutes of the film, the two coincidentally meet right before he is about to start his first day as an intern at Romy’s firm. An unhinged big dog goes berserk on the streets, heading dangerously toward Romy, giving her a near panic attack, but before the dog can bite or scratch her, he is distracted by Samuel, who calms the dog down. It’s not his dog.
“How did you get the dog to calm down?”
Romy asks Samuel a few minutes after he is introduced as one of the new interns by her junior.
“I gave it a cookie.”
“Do you always carry one on you?”
“Why? Do you want one?”
WTF?
Who in their right mind talks to their CEO like that on the first day of their job, especially when you’re completely at the bottom of the pile, just an intern expected to fetch coffees? This is after he already asks her a rude question at the interns’ meeting and is practically shooed away by Romy’s assistant over his insolence.
And Romy doesn’t even say anything. She stutters like an idiot and doesn’t behave like a woman at the top of the ladder at all. You wonder if there’s some backstory – and there really isn’t. Of course, the core part of the story is about how Romy’s sex life with her theater husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas) is completely vanilla and how she craves exciting, deviant stuff in bed, including being humiliated. But unless Samuel somehow already knew about her inner desires, his first interaction with her makes no sense whatsoever, and would, in reality, get him fired on his first day. It’s not even like Samuel is made to look like salivating material on his first day, he is wearing a suit, but he looks like some homeless dude who borrowed someone else’s clothes for the day.
The problem is that Halina Rejin never lays a believable foundation for Romy and Samuel’s affair. Their dominant-submissive dynamic kicks off from their very first scene together, without any buildup, making the story feel flat and emotionally unearned. As a result, Babygirl lacks the tension and curve of highs and lows that could have made their relationship (and the film) truly gripping.
Once the sexual affair between the older CEO and intern is underway, their dynamic does become interesting, with Samuel’s hot-and-cold behavior toward Romy becoming more believable. Babygirl is filled with sexual scenes involving the leads going to seedy hotels and sweaty pubs, acting out their ‘forbidden’ desires. And while Romy gets a huge kick out of sleeping with the young, hot intern, she is also constantly anxious about being found out. A CEO sleeping with an intern is the kind of thing that gets a CEO fired after all.
Romy’s constant shift between pleasure and paranoia is one of the highlights of Babygirl, with Nicole Kidman fantastically expressing these emotions. However, toward the end of the film, Romy is handed ‘woke’ lines that make no sense for her character, who is likely in her late 40s or 50s (the age is never spelled out, but Nicole was 56 when the film came out). The 2002 film Secretary, starring James Spader and Maggie Gyllenhaal, was far grittier in its exploration of a deviant sexual relationship between a boss and an underling.
In the climactic conflict, Romy tries to blame her childhood experiences for her mistakes and even cites how therapy hasn’t helped her. But in a fitting moment, her husband calls her out for being a terrible human being using nonsensical excuses to justify an unforgivable breach of trust.
The ending is a mess but finally gives Romy a true moment of power and a convenient closing chapter. Overall, Babygirl is a film that could’ve been so much more but ultimately ends up just another steamy movie about a person in power starting an affair with a young employee and getting away with it.
Rating: 2.5 on 5 stars. Watch Babygirl on Prime Video.
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