AILSA CHANG, HOST:
In the film "Babygirl", Nicole Kidman is Romy. A role like some you've seen Kidman play before - sexy, successful matriarch of a good family, with a loving husband. But inside Romy lies a hunger - a need that's not being met. Until a new intern arrives at the company she runs.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BABYGIRL")
HARRIS DICKINSON: (As Samuel) So, how did it start?
NICOLE KIDMAN: (As Romy) I see myself as a...
DICKINSON: (As Samuel) Power-hungry personality?
KIDMAN: (As Romy) You think that's what I am?
DICKINSON: (As Samuel) I think you like to be told what to do.
CHANG: So begins a torrid, sometimes clumsy, very kinky affair. And so a warning - in this conversation we'll be discussing sexual themes. Director and writer Halina Reijn told me that she wanted to put a feminist spin on the erotic thriller, which often revolves around the male gaze. And that is why the movie opens with a fake orgasm, which is an art form that many of us women might personally recognize.
HALINA REIJN: I heard a story from a friend who said, listen - I was in a marriage for 25 years and I always faked it. And I was so surprised and a little shocked. And I found myself responding like, no. What? Instead of saying, OK, I understand. Let's talk about it. And then I thought, oh, my God. We're actually not - I'm not even talking to my girlfriends about this issue, because I have my own issues. And so I thought, all of this I wanted to, you know, create a story about. And I think my whole movie is about performance. My whole movie is about what is real and what is fake.
CHANG: Yes.
REIJN: It's about theater and performing.
CHANG: It's not even just the contrast between performance and authenticity in bed - it's that very contrast in life. Like, so much of this story rebels against feminine ideals, because Romy, I mean, she's the trifecta, right? She's the beautiful wife, the doting mother, the path-breaking woman boss. But this story shows that she is still starving inside, isn't she?
REIJN: Yes. So the reason why I choose performing and theater as one of the biggest themes of my film is because a lot of women - and again, of course, we're generalizing during this conversation, for the sake of having a good conversation. But a lot of women still are conditioned, unfortunately, to please and nourish, and to look at themselves from an outside perspective where they think they have to be the perfect wife, the perfect leader, the perfect mother, the perfect daughter, the perfect everything. But they forget, what do I want and what is it that I need? And so this idea of performance and this idea of wearing all these different masks instead of daring to be your feral self. I always use this very superficial anecdote, but when I look in the mirror and I see a hair growing out of my nipple, I almost want to puke, you know? But why don't I look at that thinking, hey, that's a beautiful hair.
CHANG: That's my body.
REIJN: That's amazing. That's my body. That's fine. That's totally fine. And so that is what I'm trying to accomplish. Sexuality in my movie is only a metaphor for women liberating themselves in general, of course. You know, it's not just about sexuality. The orgasm is just a metaphor...
CHANG: Yes.
REIJN: ...For a bigger conversation about freedom.
CHANG: Yeah. Well, this film, obviously, it's about sex, it's about performance. But ultimately it's about power, and relinquishing power voluntarily. What I love is that Romy is outwardly the more powerful person in this dynamic. Like, she is the CEO. The man that she's become entangled with is the young intern, but it is he who is telling her what to do. What did you want to say about power in this film?
REIJN: I wanted to create a comedy of manners. A fable about power, control, surrender, sex, in an age of consent - you know? - and in a very modern and fresh way.
CHANG: Yes.
REIJN: And I also wanted to make a comedy about generations and the differences between generations. And so all of that I wanted to take and just, like, swap all the gender ideas and take all the sexual thrillers from the '90s that were amazing, and to me, very liberating. Feeling so isolated with my sexual fantasies and seeing Kim Basinger - you know, being like, oh, if Kim Basinger feels the same way, I might not be an alien after all.
CHANG: In "9 1/2 Weeks," yeah
REIJN: So to me the - in "9 1/2 Weeks." So to me, those films were incredibly comforting, but in the last act they would always go into punishing anybody who had cheated or killing, or started to murdering people. And I thought it was very grotesque and I couldn't identify with that, and I thought it wasn't human at all. So I took all the cliches and the juicy kind of aspects of these thrillers that I really enjoyed - the sexiness, the kind of like seductive world that they would always create. But then I took it into a different path so that you're kind of left, hopefully, as an audience, to use your own imagination and your own morality to come to your own conclusions.
CHANG: Well, we were mentioning the older erotic thrillers that were super-popular in the '80s and '90s, like "Fatal Attraction," "Basic Instinct." And these days we see a lot less sex on screen than we used to. Does the erotic thriller still have a place in today's culture, you think?
REIJN: Well, we'll see on Christmas Day.
(LAUGHTER)
REIJN: But no - but I do think - listen. I think after #MeToo, we were all kind of done with it for a little bit, you know? Like, I think it was a time where we were trying to reinvent it - and what does it look like? And we're still, like, what is even the female gaze? And is it possible to have a female gaze if you're a product of patriarchy? Does every woman look in the mirror and look at - looks at herself through the eyes of a male, thinking that it's her own gaze? It's very hard to even know what is the female gaze. So of course we were - for a little while I think we were all kind of afraid of sexuality on screen. And then TV was ahead of us, with all these shows that they were exploring sexuality again. And now I feel, if I'm watching a sexual thriller from the early 2000 or '90s, it feels like I'm a voyeur, which I kind of like, but it's a voyeur. A male gaze is very voyeuristic.
CHANG: Yeah.
REIJN: It's like objectifying the body. We're, like, there, but we're not really there. But with my film, what I'm trying to do is really put us in the middle. We're with them. We're in the hotel room with them. We're experiencing it with them. It's a very animalistic experience. It's not so much looking, like, oh, look at them. Like, it's a very different sexuality, so I'm...
CHANG: And yet, as a viewer, I felt invited in - not like I was peeking.
REIJN: Yes. No, exactly. And that - I always get kind of like a dirty feeling when I'm watching these sexual thrillers made by men, because that is kind of, I think, their way of telling the story, which I'm completely respectful of, and I also enjoyed. But our way of telling the story is much more, like, a warmth and openness. It starts from love. And that's how I think I want to approach it. And of course, I'm playing with cliches, and I'm playing with controversial cliches. I know that because, of course, I'm showing a woman in her prime, so powerful, yet she's crawling around on the floor when she's with her lover. But that is also because I'm exaggerating everything to provoke a discussion, to really say, what is feminism? And is true feminism, is true liberation that I can be whatever I want, whenever I want?
CHANG: Halina Reijn wrote and directed the new movie "Babygirl." It's in theaters tomorrow. Thank you so much for this fascinating conversation.
REIJN: Thank you so much for your amazing questions.
(SOUNDBITE OF CRISTOBAL TAPIA DE VEER SONG, "WOLVES") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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