Halina Reijn wants to bridge Hollywood's “orgasm gap.”
“It's huge! Huge!” exclaims the Dutch actress turned director, gesticulating wildly during our Zoom call to discuss her new film, Girl“In Hollywood movies, we still see women having orgasms that are physically impossible, at least for 99 percent of women!”
Orgasms in Girldebuting at the Venice Film Festival, it's safe to say it's going to be more realistic. And there's going to be a lot of it. After its debut in the United States, the Gen Z slasher satire Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022), Reijn returns to the more erotic tones of his first feature film, the 2019 Dutch drama Instinctwhich chronicled the illicit relationship between a prison psychologist and an incarcerated sex offender.
Girl stars Nicole Kidman as a high-powered CEO married to age-appropriate and undeniably sexy Jakob (Antonio Banderas) who embarks on a forbidden romance with a much younger intern, played by Triangle of sadness AND Iron Claw star Harris Dickinson. A24, who was behind Bodies Bodies Bodiesand released Instinct In the United States, he is planning a bow for December 20 Girl.
Ahead of the film's premiere in Venice, Reijn spoke to The Hollywood Reporter on putting a feminist spin on the '90s erotic thriller, the politics of the post-#MeToo era, and bringing sex back to the movies. “As a consumer, sometimes I just want to see a hot, sexy movie with hot people that turns me on a little bit.”
I really enjoyed your US debut. Bodies, Bodies Bodiesbut this film seems much closer, thematically, to your first Dutch film, Instinct. Do you find it more provocative to explore these themes in a large American context, rather than in a Dutch arthouse film?
I mean, we're all human and we're all struggling with pretty much the same things. But of course, in America, it's kind of a thrill, because people here are a little bit more repressed, in my eyes, than in the Netherlands. But for me, what's specific about this film is that it's really about self-love, while The instinct was actually an attempt at self-destructionWhen we were shooting Black Book [in which Reijn co-starred] Paul Verhoeven told me, “When you direct, you always have to answer a question.” With Instinct, the question was, why do I do things that I know are harmful to me, but I do them anyway? Why is there a beast inside this civilized person?
With Girlthe question was: how can I love all the parts of myself? Because I like the parts of myself that are accepted by society, but I hate the parts of myself, I'm embarrassed by the ones that aren't. I wanted to make a film to tell myself that sex is something we can celebrate and enjoy. Instead of thinking, “Oh, my God, why do I have all these taboo, forbidden fantasies?” This is really the story of a woman who liberates herself.
How are sexuality and other themes in the film addressed differently in the American context?
Well, first of all, and this is what I found so much fun to do Bodies Bodies Bodiesis that in America everything is bigger. Whether you order a cola or a hamburger, when you walk down the street, everything is much bigger than in Europe. So I really wanted to make a film on a large scale. That's why Nicole Kidman is perfect for the film. Because you can't be bigger than her. She plays this very powerful CEO of a robotics company. And the relationship that takes place is in the workplace, where, in America, less than in Europe, there is a real hierarchy and a lot more rules about what is allowed and what is not allowed. Which heightens the sense of a relationship like this as really forbidden, really taboo.
It's interesting that you mentioned Verhoeven because it seems like this film draws inspiration from those 90s erotic thrillers that he helped make famous.
I was incredibly inspired by all the sex thrillers of the 90s: Basic instinct, Fatal Attraction, 9 and a half weeks, Indecent proposalnot just because they were fun at the time, but also because I felt really seen by them, weirdly, even though they were all directed by men and had a sometimes not-so-friendly view of women. But I felt very seen by those films because as a woman with my own desires, I've always felt like an alien. And those films kind of told me that these darker desires are okay, even if, at the end of the film, the woman is mostly punished. This film is my response, my female response, to those films. It's really in dialogue with those films and looks with a little humor at the male gaze. I'm exploring questions of power and sex in our current moment, but also to have a little fun.
How is telling these stories different in the post-#MeToo era?
Well, I think we've made a huge leap forward since the '90s in terms of feminism and inclusion and all that, and that's all incredibly positive. I think the reason I'm able to direct now is because there's room for women now. But when I look back at those '90s movies, they were about desire, and I don't think there's a lot of American movies that have been made about female desire, female sexuality. I think that's pretty new, and I think there's still a lot of fear about it. There's still a huge orgasm gap, huge! It's gotten better on TV but in movies, in the biggest Hollywood movies, we still see women having orgasms that are just physically impossible, at least for 99 percent of women. I wanted to make a huge, super funny, juicy movie about sexuality, but be very honest about it.
Those films, the erotic thrillers you're talking about, have sort of disappeared from the American film scene.
In cinema, sexuality has simply disappeared. [Basic Instinct director] Paul Verhoeven always complains about this: “Where is the sex in American films?” Now with Challengers AND Burn the saltis making a bit of a comeback, but had been absent from mainstream cinema for a long time.
It just seemed like we had become very scared of sexuality. But I think there is a general need and hunger for it, a need to look at sex honestly and see the humor in it. We have all these new rules about consent, which are awesome and super important. But at the same time, we are still animalistic and we still need to look at that part of ourselves. I think that's where this desire to make these films comes from.
As a consumer, sometimes I just want to see a hot, sexy movie with hot people that turns me on a little bit. This is not soft porn. We are really trying to make a movie that is layered and interesting, but at the same time we want it to be sexy. In Europe, there have always been smaller movies about these topics, but never these bigger movies. So I welcome it. I think it's great and I think it's joyful to sit in a theater with 300 people and watch a very sexy movie. I can't think of anything more fun than that.