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Outbyte Driver Updater FREEFix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Outbyte PC Repair FREERepair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Verdict: Babygirl is worth watching for Nicole Kidman’s fearless performance and Halina Reijn’s unusually flexible handling of erotic desire, embarrassment, comedy, and danger. It is less successful as a sustained thriller—and less ethically decisive about a boss-intern relationship than its provocative premise demands—but it is far more interesting than a conventional affair drama.
Kidman plays Romy, a powerful CEO whose polished professional identity conceals desires she has never fully confronted. When Samuel (Harris Dickinson), a much younger intern, enters her orbit, their affair becomes a private experiment in submission, secrecy, shame, and self-knowledge. The film’s most compelling question is not whether Romy wants him. She clearly does. It is whether surrendering control can be liberating when the relationship is built on a workplace hierarchy, infidelity, and the possibility of coercion.
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A CEO discovers that control is not the same as freedom
Written and directed by Halina Reijn, Babygirl is a 2024 English-language erotic drama that borrows the machinery of the thriller without fully committing to thriller mechanics. Its premise is clean and immediately legible: Romy is a successful executive, wife, and mother whose encounter with Samuel, a younger intern, develops into a secret sexual relationship that threatens her career and family.
But the affair is not primarily presented as a rebellion against a loveless marriage or an escape from an incompetent husband. Jacob (Antonio Banderas) is not a villain, and Romy’s life is not depicted as emotionally barren. Her crisis is more unsettling than that. She has built a stable, admired identity around authority and self-command, only to discover a desire that asks her to step outside that identity.
#1 Best Overall
That makes Babygirl a film about the gap between public authority and private desire. Romy can run a company, manage a family, and project absolute competence. In intimate situations, however, she becomes awkward, embarrassed, uncertain, and sometimes almost adolescent. Kidman understands that these are not two unrelated versions of the character. Romy’s private vulnerability grows directly out of the effort required to remain so controlled in public.
Nicole Kidman gives the film its pulse
Kidman is the principal reason to see the movie. Her performance avoids the familiar approaches to a character like Romy. She is neither a secretly powerless executive waiting to be rescued nor a perfectly composed seductress who finally reveals a hidden appetite. Instead, Kidman makes desire look simultaneously exhilarating, humiliating, funny, and frightening.
Romy’s embarrassment is especially important. The film does not treat it as a side effect of the comedy or as evidence that she has made a foolish mistake. It is part of the movie’s understanding of desire: wanting something can destabilize the story a person tells about herself. Romy is not only afraid of being discovered by her husband, children, or colleagues. She is also afraid of discovering that her self-image has been incomplete.
Kidman plays the contradiction with remarkable precision. Romy does not stop being powerful when she submits. Nor does submission magically solve the pressures of her life. The relief she experiences is genuine, but it is also dangerous because it takes place inside an arrangement where Samuel has access to her professionally and psychologically. The performance keeps both truths visible.
Harris Dickinson makes Samuel difficult to categorize
Harris Dickinson’s Samuel is not simply a fantasy figure designed to liberate Romy. He is confident, provocative, calculating, immature, and vulnerable in shifting proportions. Dickinson gives him enough magnetism to explain the attraction while retaining a troubling uncertainty about how fully he understands the leverage he possesses.
That uncertainty is central to the film’s tension. Samuel’s commands and provocations can look like an invitation for Romy to acknowledge what she wants. They can also look like pressure applied by a younger subordinate who knows that he has unsettled his superior. The movie wants the relationship to function as a space of mutual discovery, but Samuel’s position makes every exchange more complicated than a private fantasy between equals.
The chemistry between Kidman and Dickinson is therefore unstable rather than conventionally romantic. Their scenes can be erotic, comic, alarming, or humiliating, sometimes within the same sequence. That tonal volatility is one of the film’s strengths. It prevents the affair from becoming a glossy fantasy and exposes the awkward performance involved in adopting sexual roles outside the imagination.
What the film understands about kink—and where it falters
The strongest reading of Babygirl is that it treats kink as a form of communication and self-knowledge. Romy’s desires are not automatically condemned because she is older, married, a mother, or professionally powerful. The film takes seriously the possibility that a person may want to relinquish control without wanting to surrender agency in the rest of her life.
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Rank #2
Still, Babygirl never entirely resolves the problem it raises. BDSM depends on communication, negotiated limits, trust, and the ability to withdraw consent. A boss-intern affair brings a separate set of pressures that cannot be neutralized simply because the participants discuss desire. Samuel is Romy’s subordinate. His influence is connected to the company, her authority, and the risks surrounding their secrecy. That workplace hierarchy complicates every supposedly intimate decision.
Some viewers will see the film as sex-positive because it allows Romy to possess desires without reducing her to a cautionary tale. Others will find its treatment of consent too glib, arguing that it uses the language of boundaries without fully confronting how coercive pressure can operate inside a professional relationship. Both responses are supported by what appears on screen.
It is important not to treat the movie as an instructional account of BDSM. Babygirl is a fictional drama about fantasy, secrecy, and power imbalance. Its interest lies in the questions it provokes, not in offering a reliable model for real-world kink practice.
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A marriage with enough substance to complicate the affair
Antonio Banderas gives the marriage genuine emotional and intellectual presence. Jacob is not written as a disposable obstacle whose removal would automatically make Romy’s life better. His presence means the affair has consequences beyond the revelation of Romy’s hidden appetite.
That choice makes the marriage plot more morally uncomfortable and dramatically useful. Romy’s dissatisfaction cannot be explained away by a bad husband, and her self-discovery cannot be separated from the damage caused by secrecy. The film is sympathetic to her without pretending that other people have not been placed at risk by her choices.
The family dimension produces a similar tension. Babygirl wants to frame emotional honesty as healthier than repression, but honesty does not erase the effects of betrayal. The film’s eventual movement toward openness and renegotiation will strike some viewers as humane. Others may find it too tidy given the volatility and ethical messiness of what came before.
Reijn’s tonal gamble mostly pays off
Reijn directs Babygirl as a hybrid of erotic thriller, dark comedy, relationship drama, and workplace melodrama. It is not uniformly sleek or sinister. Scenes of sexual danger are punctured by absurdity, domestic mundanity, or the awkwardness of people trying to perform roles that feel more convincing in fantasy than in ordinary life.
That tonal instability is deliberate. The film is willing to make erotic material strange and comic instead of treating every sexual moment as glamorous. It understands that role-play can be theatrical, that desire can make people ridiculous, and that humiliation is not always presented as either wholly pleasurable or wholly traumatic.
Music is another major part of the design. George Michael’s “Father Figure” plays during a dominance-and-submission sequence, a choice so conspicuous that it could easily have collapsed into a joke. Instead, the obviousness is part of the point. The scene embraces both the theatricality of the reference and the emotional specificity of the moment.
Rank #3
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The result is more character-driven than suspense-driven. The movie creates the threat of exposure, professional ruin, and domestic upheaval, but it is generally more interested in Romy’s fluctuating emotional state than in constructing an airtight thriller plot.
Where the film loses force
The marketing and premise suggest a dangerous erotic thriller, but the suspense is softer than some viewers may expect. The film’s real pressure comes from awkwardness, secrecy, and psychological exposure rather than from a consistently escalating series of thriller complications.
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Its central ethical problem is more serious. The movie knows that the workplace imbalance matters, yet it does not always provide a convincing framework for understanding what consent means under those conditions. The ambiguity can be productive, but at times it feels less like deliberate complexity than an unwillingness to follow the implications of the setup.
The supporting characters are also comparatively thin. Sophie Wilde’s Esme provides a useful younger-generation counterpoint to Romy’s carefully managed professional persona, and the family and workplace figures connect the private affair to larger systems of responsibility. Yet those characters often function as thematic architecture around the central triangle rather than as fully developed dramatic worlds.
Finally, the ending explains more than the earlier sections need it to. The film spends much of its running time making desire, consent, marriage, and power feel unstable. Its final movement tries to organize those tensions into a clearer statement about honesty and mutual understanding. That may satisfy viewers who want emotional resolution, but it reduces some of the ambiguity that made the film provocative in the first place.
Release details and what to expect
Babygirl is a 2024 U.S. production from 2AM, Man Up Film, and A24. Reijn wrote and directed the film; the principal cast includes Nicole Kidman, Harris Dickinson, Antonio Banderas, Sophie Wilde, and Esther McGregor. Jasper Wolf handled cinematography, Matt Hannam edited, Stephen Carter designed the production, and Meghan Currier composed the music.
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1Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsThe film premiered in competition at the 81st Venice Film Festival, where Kidman won the Coppa Volpi for Best Actress. The Venice record gives the runtime as 114 minutes, while other listings place it closer to 108 minutes. Describing it as approximately one hour and 50 minutes is the safest expectation.
A24 released Babygirl theatrically in the United States on December 25, 2024. Digital rental, purchase, and subscription availability can change by country, platform, and date, so check current listings before watching. Readers who prefer a physical copy can look for the Babygirl Blu-ray; those watching immediately should verify the current listing before choosing a digital rental or purchase.
Where to watch
Availability is territory-dependent and changes over time. In the United States, check current digital retailers and subscription services immediately before publication or viewing. A24 lists physical and digital viewing routes, including Amazon, but the presence, price, and format of a listing should be verified live. The film’s R rating covers strong sexual content, nudity, and language.
Who should watch Babygirl?
This is a good choice for adults interested in Nicole Kidman’s performances, contemporary erotic cinema, morally complicated relationship dramas, and films that use sexuality to examine identity and power. It is also likely to reward viewers who enjoy arguing with a movie rather than simply agreeing with it.
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It is a poor match for anyone expecting a conventional suspense film, a straightforward romance, or a realistic educational depiction of BDSM. The film includes strong sexual content, nudity, language, infidelity, pornography, humiliation, and sexual situations shaped by a workplace power imbalance. It is not appropriate for children, and viewers sensitive to coercive dynamics may want to approach it cautiously.
Final assessment
Babygirl is not a fully convincing thriller, and it does not settle the ethical questions raised by Samuel and Romy’s professional hierarchy. Its resolution smooths over conflicts that deserve sharper scrutiny. But the film’s shortcomings do not cancel its achievement: it gives a major star the space to portray female desire as awkward, selfish, funny, destabilizing, and real without forcing that desire into a simple moral lesson.
Kidman’s performance, Dickinson’s unsettling counterperformance, Reijn’s tonal nerve, and the film’s refusal to treat Romy’s appetite as inherently shameful make Babygirl worth seeing. Its greatest value is not that it solves kink, consent, marriage, or power. It is that it makes those subjects impossible to discuss casually once the credits roll.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Babygirl a conventional erotic thriller?
Not quite. It uses the threat of exposure and professional or domestic fallout, but it is more interested in psychological awkwardness, sexual role-play, marriage, and self-knowledge than in sustained suspense.
Is Babygirl a positive or negative portrayal of BDSM?
The film presents kink as connected to communication, boundaries, and self-knowledge, but its boss-intern relationship creates a serious power imbalance. It is best understood as a contested fictional depiction, not an instructional or authoritative guide to BDSM.
What is Babygirl about?
Nicole Kidman plays Romy, a high-powered CEO who begins a secret relationship with Samuel, a much younger intern played by Harris Dickinson. The affair forces her to confront desires that conflict with her public authority, family life, and need for control.
Who stars in Babygirl?
The principal cast includes Nicole Kidman as Romy, Harris Dickinson as Samuel, Antonio Banderas as Jacob, Sophie Wilde as Esme, and Esther McGregor as Isabel.
What is Babygirl rated?
The film is rated R for strong sexual content, nudity, and language. It also involves infidelity, pornography, humiliation, and sexual situations shaped by workplace power dynamics.
The Bottom Line
The bottom line: Babygirl is a provocative, uneven character study elevated by Nicole Kidman’s fearless performance. Watch it for the questions it raises about desire, surrender, consent, and identity—not because it offers a definitive answer to any of them.
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