Halina Reijn’s 2022 English-language debut, Bodies Bodies Bodies, was a nasty slasher whodunit that poked around in its Gen Z characters’ heads. The Dutch director’s more complex new film, Babygirl, is an erotic thriller that again considers the ways in which young people are wired differently, knowing what they want and how to get it. It repeatedly asks who’s in control in a dangerous game of seduction that keeps shifting the lines in its consideration of desire, gender roles and power dynamics.

A high-powered CEO (Nicole Kidman) puts her career and family on the line when she begins a torrid affair with her much younger intern (Harris Dickinson).

Reviews

"This is a sexy, darkly funny, and bold piece of work. Don’t sleep on it." – IndieWire

"Babygirl lasts longer in the mind than you think it might, opening up a slipstream for female artists who are ready and willing to take such hot-button issues — women, sexuality and power — and take them to even wilder extremes." – Deadline