Cinephiles haven’t got long left now until the highly anticipated Babygirl lands in UK cinemas.
The filmmaker behind Bodies Bodies Bodies, Halina Reijn wrote and directed the A24 erotic thriller, which explores the themes of desire, identity, and the pressure of perfection.
Kidman's performance earned her the prized Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival in September. She has since received a Golden Globe nomination, but she lost out on the top honour to Fernanda Torres, a Brazilian actress who starred in I'm Still Here.
When is Babygirl in UK cinemas?
Babygirl is set to arrive in UK cinemas on Friday, January 10.
A24 have yet to announce a streaming date for the film.
Who is Nicole Kidman playing?
Romy, a CEO in the movie, seems to have it all: a successful business, a loving spouse (Antonio Banderas), two teenage children (Esther McGregor and Vaughan Reilly), and a seemingly normal, healthy life.
However, beneath her flawless exterior is something much more nuanced, and her fantasies push her into a dangerous relationship with her younger intern (Harris Dickinson).
Babygirl was originally set in the summer, but a last-minute rewrite turned it into a Christmas movie, Ms Reijn told The Hollywood Reporter.
She said: “I wrote it as a summer movie; it was all going to take place in the Hamptons and it was going to be on the beach.
“Then the strike happened, of course it was pencils down and we had to wait, and then the schedule became Christmas. And I was like, ‘We should definitely make this into a Christmas movie’ and after the strike, I just rewrote the whole thing to Christmas.”
Who is Harris Dickinson?
Dickinson is a 28-year-old actor from east London.
His first major performance was in the drama film Beach Rats (2017), for which he received a nomination for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead.
Since then, he has starred in a number of projects including the miniseries A Murder at the End of the World (2023), Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (2019), The King's Man (2021), Triangle of Sadness (2022), Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), and The Iron Claw (2023).
He has been nominated for two BAFTA Awards.
Dickinson nearly chose to join the Royal Marines, but his coach at the RAW Academy in London convinced him to go back to theatre.
What have the reviews said?
The film has received mostly positive reviews with critics praising Kidman’s acting skills but others are suggesting it hasn’t got the intensity for an erotic thriller film.
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave Babygirl two stars, writing: “An apparently super-transgressive exercise in workplace sub/dom role play but that is weirdly without any actual emotional or corporate consequence, without the menace that was supposed to make it so exciting.”
TheWrap’s Ben Croll said: “Like a sheep in wolf’s clothing, Halina Reijn’s surprisingly genteel Babygirl might bare the occasional fang, but it doesn’t have much bite.”
Kyle Smith from the Wall Street Journal said: “Romy has the messy, multifaceted nature of a fully realized character from a literary novel or a memoir, and Ms. Kidman, who is as gifted as she is fearless, is the ideal actress to capture her.”
While Ryan Lattanzio of IndieWire praised Babygirl’s two leads, writing: “Without Kidman in a fearless turn and Dickinson there to pivot her to the edge, Babygirl wouldn’t work as smashingly as it does. This is a sexy, darkly funny, and bold piece of work. Don’t sleep on it.”
The Hollywood Reporter’s David Rooney tops that review on Rotten Tomatoes, adding: “What makes it entertaining is not just the actors’ skilled navigation of every tricky challenge but also the script’s refusal of judgment and rigid moral codes.”
