Baby Invasion

80 minutesCountryUnited StatesLanguageEnglish

Baby Invasion is a 2024 American experimental thriller film written and directed by Harmony Korine, produced through his EDGLRD multimedia company. The film centers on a home invasion in which the intruders' faces have been swapped with baby faces using artificial intelligence.^[1] According to Korine, the film is structured as a first-person shooter game with interactive elements.^[2]

The film had its world premiere out of competition at the 81st Venice International Film Festival, on August 31, 2024.^[1] The film will have its United States premiere at Fantastic Fest 2024, on September 23, 2024.^[3]

In a first person shooter game leaked to the dark web, a group of mercenaries disguised with baby faces invade mansions of the wealthy and powerful.^[4] However, as gamers livestream the game, the protagonists’ gang of horrific murders may or may not be happening in real life.

In an interview with Variety, Korine characterized Baby Invasion as well as his previous EDGLRD production Aggro Dr1ft as works of "post-cinema" he termed "blinx" for their unconventional nature.^[2] Visual effects for Baby Invasion were created using artificial intelligence and video game engines.^[2] British electronic producer Burial created an original score for the film.^[4] Of the score, Korine said, "I never actually met Burial and I never actually spoke with Burial. So it was all done through Discord messages, and we'd kind of talk on PS5. And then the music was sent through PS5."^[5]

Baby Invasion premiered out of competition at the 81st Venice International Film Festival on August 31, 2024.^[1] During the Venice press conference, Korine sat next to visual effects artist Joao Rosa and fellow filmmaker Gaspar Noé, who was wearing a neon green mask, and smoked a cigar, causing smoke to fill the conference room. He expressed that "Hollywood ... would be smart to — encourage the youth, the kids. Why we're starting to see Hollywood crumble creatively is because they’re losing a lot of the most creative minds to gaming and to streaming. They're so locked in on convention and then all those kids who are so creative are now just going to find other pathways and go to other places because movies are no longer the dominant art form." He also revealed that, "When we release the film, there'll be a way to watch it through your phone, but there'll be certain codes within the movie that'll take you to other movies. So the film, what you're seeing, is just a base layer film. There'll be three or four other sub films."^[5]

On Metacritic, the film holds an average score of 39 out of 100 based on reviews from 7 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".^[6]

Peter Debruge of Variety gave the film a mixed review, writing "though little more than a gimmick, the baby angle gives Korine a hook for an experiment that’s only intermittently engaging for much of its running time."^[7]