A24, the company behind films like Room, Moonlight, Lady Bird, Everything Everywhere All at Once and Past Lives, is as bold and daring a distributor as any in the movie business today. Rarely has that been more evident than it is in a pair of films that they brought to the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival (to say nothing of the film that they acquired during the fest, a nearly four-hour VistaVision epic intended for projection in 70mm).
Italian filmmaker Luca Guadagnino’s Queer and Dutch filmmaker Halina Reijn’s Babygirl both came to Toronto after having their world premieres at the Venice Film Festival. Both films star bona fide Hollywood A-listers — Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman, respectively — in highly risqué roles that explore sexual inhibitions, or lack thereof, and power dynamics. (The Venice jury awarded Kidman the fest’s best actress prize, and Craig was rumored to be in serious contention for its best actor prize.)
They each received lengthy Venice standing ovations (of nine minutes and seven minutes, respectively) and have each been embraced by critics on both sides of the pond (with Rotten Tomatoes scores of 78 percent and 94 percent, respectively). However, I suspect that both will face an uphill climb with awards voters. Queer feels very long at 135 minutes, which may have contributed to a considerable number of walkouts at all of its screenings; and both films have a lot of explicit nudity and sex scenes, which may be tough for voters of a certain age.
But — but — the performances at their center have engendered considerable respect and admiration even from people who aren’t crazy about the movies in which they are featured, which is why I think that the actors branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences may well nominate them. It recently nominated several other strong performances in polarizing pics, such as Glenn Close’s in 2020’s Hillbilly Elegy, Andra Day’s in 2020’s The United States vs. Billie Holiday and Ana de Armas‘ in 2022’s Blonde.
Queer, which A24 acquired shortly before Venice, is an adaptation by Justin Kuritzkes (who also wrote Guadagnino’s other highly sexual 2024 film, Challengers) from the late counter-cultural icon William S. Burroughs’ 1985 semi-autobiographical novel of the same novel (which was written decades earlier). In it, Craig plays Burroughs’ alter-ego, Bill Lee, an openly gay American expat in 1940s Mexico City who seems to do nothing but try to feed his endless appetite for booze, drugs and sex with other men.
In a film that evolves (or devolves?) from realistic to trippy (it’s a relative of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, both the 1971 book and the 1998 film), Craig leaves it all out there, literally and figuratively. It’s a total transformation unlike anything we’ve ever seen him do before, at least onscreen (he’s a wonderful stage actor too). Rolling Stone called it “the role of a lifetime” and “a milestone in his career,” while The Hollywood Reporter’s review describes Craig’s efforts as “a transfixing performance.”
As for Kidman in Babygirl — which A24 financed from the start, having previously worked with the filmmaker on her 2022 English-language directorial debut Bodies Bodies Bodies — she plays Romy. The wife, mother of teens and corporate CEO has sexual needs that are not being met at home, so she consequently embarks on an affair with a much younger intern at her office.
The film — which, oddly enough, will be released on Christmas Day — plays in some ways like an erotic thriller in the vein of classics of yesteryear like Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct. But in other ways it’s very modern and timely, joining Tár and Fair Play in standouts of the #MeToo era.
Kidman, for her part, is outstanding, as demonstrated not only by the Venice award (which she sadly wasn’t able to accept in-person because her mother died the day she was chosen for it), but also by the wave of reviews celebrating her performance (including THR’s, which highlights her “fearlessness” and describes her as being “in spectacular form”).
