Heavy lies the crown upon the head of the Girl Boss, an archetype capable of prompting inspiration and mockery within the same sentence. The haunted bauble that awaits those with enough stamina to hack through the briarpatch of patriarchy, it’s a mantle that uses sleight of hand to swap out autonomy for burden under cover of darkness. A foisting that would make Larry David proud, the quest for gender equality has led to many men opting out of presumed leadership all together, stranding wives, girlfriends, and single ladies with an endless to-do list, and precious little time for relaxation or introspection. This woeful over-simplification of modern affairs has innumerable exceptions and caveats, but that sense of burnout, of looking after everyone while no one looks after you, is knowable. How many waves of feminism do we need before a woman can get a little peace and quiet around here? Forget equanimity; how about someone else starts making sure the trains run on time.

You get the feeling that Romy (Nicole Kidman) would like a task or two taken off her plate, or for anything to function properly without her direct oversight. As the CEO of an automation company in Christmas-time New York, she’s used to calling the shots, a task that bleeds into home life when her needy husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas) and two teenage daughters (Esther McGregor and Vaughan Reilly) await her nightly arrival with a slew new assignments, both literal and emotional. All this overcrowding needs an outlet, one that Romy finds in Samuel (Harris Dickinson), a 20-something intern with a talent for knowing what to say and do without being told. The illicit affair they strike up is initially notable for the age disparity, but the power dynamic is more fluid than simple numbers can communicate. It’s being seen that matters.

Jacob has been struggling in that field of late, or perhaps for their whole relationship. With a job as a theater director and a voice that never rises above an amenable hum, he’s adorned with all the markers of sensitive masculinity, which, in Babygirl’s satirical worldview, includes an inability to sexually satisfy his partner. Romy’s tawdry infidelity may be the headline here, but defining her search as one geared toward physical contentment alone is making a molehill out of a mountain. The quest runs deeper, though writer/director Halina Reijn wisely avoids over-explication, depending on the symbols and context of her tightly constructed screenplay to do the talking. Actions speak louder than words, and the fact that the life work of our protagonist involves creating a system of robotics whose proficiency isn’t dependent on constant supervision isn’t incidental. A little delegation would go a long way, but asking for help is its own form of labor.

Unlike her loving but oblivious brood, Samuel is capable of picking up on her exhaustion without needing the hint, descending like a guardian angel with an eye toward sensuous pleasure. More of an enigma than a proper character, his motivations and individuality remain vague throughout, a product of being presented to us through Romy’s eyes. It’s a thankless part that Dickinson navigates with esteemable ease, a captivating sense of mystery attending his every word and gesture. His charisma makes up for what’s missing on the page, and while Kidman’s familiarity with cinema’s more salacious side provides a welcome metatextual entry point, Babygirl is ultimately Dickinson’s movie. Both actor and character benefit from the thrill of the unknown, especially when juxtaposed against such expertly arranged monotony.

No one would accuse Reijn of being a showy stylist, but the handsome mundanity on display fits the story like one of Romy’s designer-made suits. The New York captured by cinematographer Jasper Wolf is sleek but drab, open yet leering, an edition of GQ that’s made a deal with the devil. Samuel’s outfits certainly wouldn’t make the cover, with the costume design by the hilariously credited Kurt and Bart folding neatly into the flick’s prioritization of show over tell. Even the sex scenes have a barebones unveiling that benefits from lack of affectation, made both steamier and more discomforting by the absence of varnish. Like Romy herself, Reijn seems tired of all the spoon feeding, unspooling her yarn without insisting on her own prowess. 

She certainly has it in her, with the director’s previous feature, 2022’s Bodies Bodies Bodies, practically overflowing with auteurist choices and surging pazazz. Babygirl has a different set of aesthetic and dramaturgical aspirations, ones modest enough in scale to be overlooked in a crowded movie marketplace. Like the film’s centrifugal force, Reijn’s done enough standing out already, and would like for us to match her level of attentiveness and preparation. The resultant objectivity, both stylistically and morally, culminates in a refusal to punish any of the players in the picture’s wicked game, a clear call for the audience to come to their own conclusions. Reijn is over all the glad handing. Her movie may be small, but it knows what it wants. Just don’t expect it laid out on a silver platter.