At the Movies, the ‘Older Woman’ Is Growing Up

She has been called “cougar,” “Mrs. Robinson” and “your mom.” Now she’s the protagonist, and one of film and television’s most compelling characters.

The older woman has been very busy lately. By “older woman,” I am referring to the cinematic figure who is defined by her sexual and romantic relationships with younger men. Depending on your own age, you may know her as the “cougar,” the “Mrs. Robinson,” or the joke about “your mom.” Now she is the protagonist. And she has never had so many scene partners to choose from.

Let’s review her banner year. In a succession of streaming romance films, she was wooed by a boy-band member (“The Idea of You”), an action movie star (“A Family Affair”) and a finance bro (“Lonely Planet”). For Christmas (having been very good all year), she got a starring role in the erotic thriller “Babygirl” as a robotics company executive who fell into a submissive sexual relationship with her new intern — and fixed her life.

The bounty of the older woman’s recent plots, and the complexity of her new arrangements, come as a thrill, and a relief. For so long, the movies have flattened her into a villain or reduced her to a joke. They have paired her with weasels and virgins. She has been made to manipulate young men because she is pathetic or insane. She was less a character than a stand-in for the movie’s themes — a symbol for some form of generational rot or another.

Now, she can still be a monster (as in Catherine Breillat’s “Last Summer,” where she is a defense attorney with a sadistic streak who pursues her teenage stepson). Occasionally she’s a victim (as in “Disclaimer,” the limited series about an investigative journalist ensnared by a depraved teenage tourist). But increasingly she is a person in a nuanced relationship. Her personality has been cleansed of the too-obvious psychological tics (alcoholism, narcissism, delusion) used to explain her unseemly propositions. These days, it is often the young man who comes on to her. He has become the blunt tool for revealing the depths of her shifting character.