Babygirl review: Nicole Kidman sizzles in this dark, sexy thriller – in a role that could overwhelm many

BABYGIRL

(18) 108mins

★★★★★

HER recent roles seemed to confirm Nicole Kidman had been typecast.

From Big Little Lies to The Perfect Couple, Nicole was always playing a wealthy, successful mother with a seemingly idyllic life.

So it was with some apprehension that I approached Babygirl, with Kidman playing Romy, a successful chief executive, who looks immaculate, loves her family and keeps a stunning home.

But within the first few minutes I realised that I needn’t have worried — as I haven’t seen the Oscar-winning actor like this since 1999’s sexy thriller, Eyes Wide Shut.

The opening scene shows Romy and husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas) in the throes of passion. Romy appears to be having a great time with her loving husband.

But we quickly realise she was faking it when she races off to another room the moment he’s asleep to watch porn and, well, see to herself.

Romy is a control freak, you see.

Each minute of her life is ordered and perfectly structured — including her sex life.

Which is absolutely no fun at all.

Soon her head is turned by a new, young intern, Samuel (Harris Dickinson).

He is fearless, with a strangely intoxicating confidence, and is difficult to read.

Romy is fascinated by him and he knows it — telling her in one of their first meetings, “I think you like to be told what to do”.

There starts an intense and erotic affair, with Samuel taking Romy to places she’s never been before.

Both physically and literally.

She visits grotty hotels and illegal raves just to be near him.

She strips on demand and even licks from a saucer of milk on her hands and knees.

But a shirtless dance sequence to George Michael’s Father Figure by Samuel is the most hypnotic of all — and you understand Romy’s unrelenting obsession with this alpha 20-something.

Hell, you will have one too.

Sexy, dark and thrilling, Babygirl is a fresh and tantalising look at the struggles of successful women between the boardroom and bedroom.

Kidman is exquisite in a role that could overwhelm many.

She perfectly balances the power and vulnerability.

But it’s Dickinson who makes this film a watch that will stay with you.

He manages to maintain an air of intrigue and demands attention in every single scene.’

A REAL PAIN

(15) 90mins

★★★★☆

COUSINS David (Jesse Eisenberg) and Benji (Kieran Culkin) embark on a once-in-a-lifetime journey to Poland, in a bid to reconnect with each other and grapple with the haunting legacy of their family’s history.

Hoping to visit the home where their late grandmother, a Holocaust survivor, once lived, they join a Jewish heritage tour.

What begins as a seemingly simple trip soon unfolds into a poignant exploration of identity, grief and the scars left by generational trauma.

Written, directed and partly produced by Eisenberg, A Real Pain skilfully walks a tightrope between humour and heartbreak as it delivers a story that feels both intimate and universal.

Eisenberg crafts a narrative that’s as much about struggles with depression and anxiety as it is about the unspoken weight of history.

Culkin’s Golden Globe- winning performance as the free-spirited yet emotionally complex Benji is a standout, offering both comic relief and raw vulnerability.

Over the course of the 90-minute film, the chalk-and-cheese cousins argue, laugh, drift apart and find their way back to each other in ways that feel authentic and deeply moving.

The film is a triumph, delivering a story that transforms deeply rooted pain into something profoundly human.

• Linda Marric

MARIA

(12A) 123mins

★★★★☆

TO me, listening to opera is on a par with sitting through a political party conference – pure masochism.

So, I turned up to the screening of this biopic of the late super-soprano Maria Callas with great trepidation and a pair of ear plugs in my pocket, just in case.

Thankfully, I didn’t need them because the opera only blasts out in small, selective bursts.

Instead, Maria treats us to Angelina Jolie in one of her best performances to date.

Angelina appears to be totally attuned to the troubled Greek star, who faced accusations of diva-like behaviour and endured a tortured love life.

She is aided by a thoughtful script from Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, who sets this story in the final week of Callas’s life in September 1977 when a minimal diet combined with a cocktail of drugs led her to an inevitable death.

As she wanders through familiar haunts in Paris, Callas remembers her past and hallucinates an interview with a reporter.

It is these flashbacks that take the audience to key moments in her life.

Occasionally, director Pablo Larrain’s movie strays into sentimentality.

But at the final curtain, taking the tragedy out of the legend’s death is something that deserves a round of applause.

• Grant Rollings