Babygirl's Nicole Kidman, Halina Reijn on women, sex, and power

A promo poster for the A24 film Babygirl, in theaters Christmas Day, asserts, “This Christmas, get everything you want.” And that’s precisely what the movie from Bodies Bodies Bodiesdirector Halina Reijn dives into from a woman’s perspective when Nicole Kidman’s Romy and Harris Dickinson’s Samuel begin to explore a dom/sub relationship that flips the dynamics in terms of age and status. Power and intergenerational differences are at the core of the film according to Kidman and Reijn.

“I wanted to make a movie about power dynamics, but in very different ways, not only sexually, but also in the workplace. And as a woman, how you deal with all these different power dynamics and what is expected of you and what you truly feel,” Reijn tells The Advocate. “So to me, in every scene, power dynamics are at play and we had so much fun with them using the cliches, using the tropes, and then moving away from it and really trying to be as authentic with all of us as we could and bring radical honesty to these themes.”

On the surface, Romy’s life is idyllic. She leads a cutting-edge tech company and is married to a loving, handsome man, Jacob, played by Antonio Banderas. They have two daughters, Nora (Vaughan Reilly) and Isabel (Esther McGregor), a queer teen whose modern approach to sex and love is instructive for her mother on some level.

Nicole Kidman as Romy and Harris Dickinson as Samuel in Babygirl A24

“Halina did Bodies Bodies Bodies, so [she has an] understanding [of] the generations coming together to teach each other, and the younger generation in this film tends to be the ones teaching,” Kidman says. “Esther, who plays my daughter in the film, she was so interesting. She's so delicate, but she's so strong and it's more like I'm watching her and learning from her, and then able to relate to Harris because of the way in which she's penetrating my psyche.”

Despite her picture-perfect life, Romy leaves sex with her husband to watch porn and fantasize about being a submissive, something Jacob won’t or can’t indulge her in. Her fantasies are realized when Samuel joins her company as an intern, albeit one she’s seen exhibit control over a dog in the street. During a company outing, Samuel sends Romy a glass of milk and instructs her to drink it in the bar. From there, she’s on her knees in a hotel room, and the power shifts.

But Samuel is no seasoned dominant. His proclivities are only fulfilled when he and Romy sense something in one another.

Babygirl director Halina Reijn and star Nicole KidmanA24

“They're both performing these roles. They've never done it before, so there's an element of insecurity to what they do. And I think that was part of the fun to show that as well with how we explored that,” Dickinson says. “But it's interesting to think about where has our understanding of sexual relationships come from, whether it's pop culture or porn or film or whatever. It's interesting to kind of play with that. And I think Halina wanted to do that, and that was always a part of the conversations.”

The idea of a female gaze on-screen has been a part of the dialectic for years now and this exploration of dom/sub dynamics in and out of the bedroom from a female writer-director lends to those conversations. Kidman shares what it was like to work with a woman on a film where she bares so much of herself in multiple ways.

“[It felt] very safe, very intimate. A lot of freedom and expressing because [she’s] such a great listener,” Kidman says. “To be able to say things, and it felt like secrets were being exchanged, and then she was able to process those and put them into the film. And through that it feels very free and hopefully very visceral. And it's coming from a very feeling-centered place.”

Babygirl is in theaters Wednesday.