It‘s not the first time Nicole Kidman has starred in what look like a prestige drama but which might actually be glossy-sheened smut – that was a movie called The Paperboy where she played a trailer trash Floridian woman who intended to marry an imprisoned murderer and peed on Zac Efron after he got stung by a jellyfish.

This time she plays Romy, the high powered CEO of a tech company, living the high life in a palatial apartment overlooking the Empire State Building with her handsome husband Jacob (Antonio Banderas) and their two teen daughters). When we meet Romy she's straddling her husband in their marital bed, engaged in sex that seems extremely hot and satisfying for them both.

But after she climbs off Jacob, she sneaks into the living room with her laptop and lies on her stomach on the carpet, masturbating while watching porn. She's either a great actress in bed who's not at all satisfied with her husband or she's a bit of an insatiable horndog.

But when her company has a new intake of interns, a handsome but slightly arrogant-seeming young man catches her eye, Samuel (Harris Dickinson). Through the machinations of the program, he picks her as his mentor, which puts them in the same room with increasing frequency, and its during one of those meetings he expresses his desire for her, nearly bringing the strong, confident and accomplished woman undone with his commanding sexual presence and apparent desire for her to be a submissive.

Against all her misgivings and her better judgement, Romy kisses him, but comes to her senses and makes him leave, citing the abuse of power their attraction represents. He actually tells her he's the one with the power because he could ruin her with one sexual harassment accusation, which is true, but it only seems to further strengthen his position of sexual dominance, one which she can't deny is driving her wild.

Romy tries to resist, but soon the pair are in a hotel playing power games and having sex, Romy drawn into an affair that's as wrong and dangerous as it is thrilling and sexually fulfilling. She's as disgusted as she is thrilled by crawling along the floor at Samuel's command like a dog or gyrating against him amongst a club full of sweaty kids somewhere in Brooklyn.

It can only end badly, and all that's left is to see if Romy will get her happy ending, a woman with needs some might consider aberrant but who deserves fulfilment and satisfaction as much as anyone else. I was reminded of the stories you hear about very powerful people (judges, politicians, business leaders, etc) going to brothels to be dressed up like babies, berated by maternal figures and treated helplessly as a sexual outlet.

The movie has a high sheen, very Vogue living-inspired befitting the corporate and home environments wealthy people like Romy, Jacob and their family would live in, but I feel like what was missing a little bit was what it was saying. That powerful women in their 50s get horny and deserve satisfaction in bed? That we should all communicate what we want from sex with spouses or partners (and they should do their best to listen and understand) without shame or embarrassment?

Is America such a politically conservative country that stuff counts as subversive as far as screen stories go? I suspect it's an extension of the way Hollywood has always depicted sex – practices plenty of us indulge in very happily and satisfactorily without it needing all the emotional bombshells around power, gender relations and the constantly-ready-to-panic American body politic.