While watching Amanda Kramer’s Please Baby Please, I keep wondering about its central couple, Arthur and Suze. Harry Melling and Andrea Riseborough act as the 1950s New York’s tapestry, and yes, that tapestry is freaky. They have neighbours (Demi Moore) inspiring them/ each other to break into dance. They are also at each other’s throats. That hapens after witnessing a biker gang’s violent act in front of their brownstone. One of those bikers is Teddy (Karl Glusman), whose presence makes them question their sexuality.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about Please Baby Please‘s tangential involvement in Oscar discourse. That’s because I’ve read too many pieces reading that she deserved a nomination for this film instead. I say this even when she’s doing a great Marlon Brando impersonation. Back on topic, 2022 was a competitive year that even this won’t make top 5 but I’ll talk about that in a bit, but aside from her, the film has two actors deserving praise – Demi Moore and Cole Escola. This film begins Moore’s good weird era (compliment), and Escola shows why they deserve their future awards.

Ok fine, it’s time to talk about Riseborough’s performance here who again, wasn’t in my top 5 three years ago. Mine are Frankie Corio, Michelle Yeoh for the win, Rejane Faria, Rooney Mara, and Tang Wei. Anyway, imagine Riseborough as a young Bette Davis in Beatnik era New York and that comparison alone is praise. Riseborough is not at 11 in Please Baby Please but she matches the film’s energy. And that energy is understandable in playing a character who doesn’t know what kind of power she wants yet.  And one day, I’ll find someone who understands why I’ll scream “MY KEYS” the way she does in this film.

Men and women battle each other and themselves in Please Baby Please and do it in NYC, and its version of that city is reminiscent of Robert Wise’s West Side Story but with leather. Characters come out of the shadows, screaming out of the void, exorcising the demons they should embrace. Or sometimes, those characters are shadows themselves that the film bathes in bisexual lighting, expressions of deviance. It’s only been three years but filmmakers need to make more films like this that love nightlife.

The one real critique I have of Please Baby Please is one that other critics said already – it’s that it doesn’t commit to being a musical, and songs are too few and far between. Sometimes these musical numbers are just dance numbers without songs, and other directors can sell that better. Despite that, I like that a woman is central in a story about a couple’s sexual discoveries. Or more accurately, that it remembers both characters’ sides and needs in ways real life sometimes doesn’t.

Please Baby Please is available to stream on OVID.