{"id":196066,"date":"2024-12-24T12:19:57","date_gmt":"2024-12-24T17:19:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=196066"},"modified":"2025-01-12T11:33:05","modified_gmt":"2025-01-12T16:33:05","slug":"review-babygirl-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=196066","title":{"rendered":"Review: <i>Babygirl<\/i> (2024)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/8153187.3-e1735060388554.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"425\" height=\"611\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-196067\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/8153187.3-e1735060388554.jpg 425w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/8153187.3-e1735060388554-139x200.jpg 139w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/8153187.3-e1735060388554-278x400.jpg 278w, https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/8153187.3-e1735060388554-70x100.jpg 70w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 425px) 100vw, 425px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\nI&#8217;ve been really looking forward to this one, especially because it&#8217;s what is known as &#8220;divisive&#8221;. It&#8217;s fun to finally see it and make up my own mind. I&#8217;ve been writing about Harris Dickinson since he first arrived in 2017&#8217;s <i>Beach Rats<\/i> and have reviewed most of his films (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rogerebert.com\/reviews\/beach-rats-2017\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Beach Rats<\/em><\/a>, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rogerebert.com\/reviews\/postcards-from-london-2018\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Postcards from London<\/a><\/em>, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rogerebert.com\/reviews\/matthias-and-maxime-movie-review-2020\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Matthias and Maxime<\/a><\/em>, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rogerebert.com\/reviews\/scrapper-movie-review-2023\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Scrapper<\/a><\/em>) &#8211; and this is definitely not just a culmination but the opportunity to show his very unique stuff on a much wider stage. One of the most exciting young new actors working today. Along with Paul Mescal. <\/p>\n<p>At any rate. I dug <i>Babygirl<\/i>. It&#8217;s <em>funny<\/em>. I have some experience in this sort of thing, and the film captures a certain VIBE, which may not be comprehensible to people from the outside. &#8220;Female masochism is just a male fantasy,&#8221; says the husband in <i>Babygirl<\/i>. Uh-huh. Okay. And that&#8217;s what I&#8217;ll say about THAT. So many films like this position the kinky sex as dangerous and threatening to the status quo, to the conventional, the expected life-path for straight people. But if you&#8217;ve never fit in with the status quo, if you don&#8217;t value the rules of the status quo because they don&#8217;t work for you (like, at all), then all other kinds of things are possible. Like fun. And funniness. And yeah, there IS a status quo in <i>Babygirl<\/i> but the film positions it in an interesting way.<\/p>\n<p>I read a review where the (male) critic referred to the relationship between the CEO and her intern as &#8220;toxic&#8221;. Maybe to you, ya normie. The only &#8220;toxic&#8221; relationship here was between the CEO and her husband. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rogerebert.com\/reviews\/babygirl-nicole-kidman-film-review\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Here&#8217;s my review of <i>Babygirl<\/i><\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\n<small><em>Thank you so much for stopping by. If you like what I do, and if you feel inclined to support my work, here&#8217;s a link to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.venmo.com\/u\/Sheila-OMalley-3\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">my Venmo account<\/a>. And I&#8217;ve launched a Substack, <a href=\"https:\/\/sheilaomalley.substack.com\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sheila Variations 2.0<\/a>, if you&#8217;d like to subscribe.<\/em> <\/small><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/sheilaomalley.substack.com\/embed\" width=\"480\" height=\"320\" style=\"border:1px solid #EEE; background:white;\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve been really looking forward to this one, especially because it&#8217;s what is known as &#8220;divisive&#8221;. It&#8217;s fun to finally see it and make up my own mind. I&#8217;ve been writing about Harris Dickinson since he first arrived in 2017&#8217;s &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=196066\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[366,2668,2561,2637],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196066"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=196066"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196066\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":196457,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196066\/revisions\/196457"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=196066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=196066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=196066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}