LADIES FIRST (2026) – A Lamp-Post Knock to the Patriarchy and The Boys Get Benched

Sacha Baron Cohen stars as Damian, a wildly successful advertising executive whose greatest talent—besides selling things—is being spectacularly insufferable. A committed male chauvinist with all the subtlety of a billboard, Damian gets an unexpected lesson in perspective after an unfortunate encounter with a lamp post sends him tumbling into an alternate reality. In this topsy-turvy world, women occupy the dominant role in society while men are reduced to the patronised, underestimated, and objectified sex. It is not exactly a new comic setup, but Ladies First proves that a familiar premise can still feel fresh when handled with enough charm, energy, and just the right amount of cheek.

To its credit, the film knows it is skating on thin comedic ice. After all, its entire engine runs on one central joke: what if gender roles were flipped and society behaved accordingly? Fortunately, the film squeezes this premise for all it is worth. The visual gags come thick and fast, from advertisements repackaged for the female gaze to men being treated as decorative accessories rather than serious people. Even history gets a playful rewrite, with iconic public figures reimagined as women. The joke lands not simply because it is silly—though it often is—but because it gleefully exposes how absurd these double standards look once the shoe is on the other foot. It is satire delivered with a wink, not a lecture, which makes it all the more enjoyable.

At the heart of the story is a fairy-tale-like moral reckoning. To break free of this strange new reality, Damian must navigate the very prejudices and humiliations he once casually inflicted on women, all while clawing his way toward the CEO position. The arc is hardly subtle, but subtlety is not really the point here. What matters is that the film gives Damian’s comeuppance enough comic sting to be satisfying and enough emotional sincerity to make his eventual growth believable. Rosamund Pike is particularly strong as Alex, Damian’s long-suffering employee in the real world and his formidable superior in the alternate one. Pike appears to be having enormous fun with the role, and her performance adds a delicious bite to the film and as always, effortlessly watchable.

In the end, Ladies First is thoroughly entertaining from beginning to end. Yes, its destination is visible from quite a long way off, but the journey is buoyant enough that one hardly minds. The film never mistakes itself for a manifesto, nor does it pretend to offer a deeply nuanced thesis on gender politics. Instead, it operates as a lively, good-natured comedy with a satirical edge, poking fun at male chauvinism and the everyday indignities of female exploitation without losing its sense of fun. It is clever without becoming smug, pointed without turning preachy, and funny enough to keep its social message from feeling like homework—which, in comedy, is no small achievement.