REVIEW: ‘Sorry, Baby’ Is A Stunning Show Of Eva Victor’s Many Talents

Eva Victor proves themself a sensational multi-talent in their new film from A24, Sorry Baby. As writer, director, and star, the deeply upsetting, hilarious, inspiring, and beautiful film transforms a quiet New England college town into a terrifying, lonely, beautiful place. Their character, Agnes, went through something horrible there several years ago, and when Agnes’ best friend, Lydie (Naomi Ackie), comes to visit four years later, things might start to change for Agnes.

The description for Sorry Baby is quite vague, and intentionally so. It’s not trying to hide anything about its subject matter. The movie quickly begins taking shape, and the traumatic event that Agnes endured becomes clear long before it’s explicitly spelled out. Folks who are sensitive to specific subjects may want to watch the trailer or read a more detailed description of its inciting events before viewing. But the vagueness is intentional because discussing the worst day of your life out loud is incredibly difficult and painful.

Sorry Baby shows this pain perfectly. It opens four years after the bad thing happens, and only hints of Agnes’ being unwell are evident at first. The house is a bit unkempt. Conversations between Agnes and Lydie grow increasingly awkward and repetitive as the days go on. The camera is almost always positioned at a low angle, with noticeably squared framing of its subject.

Eva Victor is equally excellent as director, writer, and actor in A24’s Sorry Baby.

That is, except for the brilliant occasions when it becomes dynamic and frantic, taking sharp swings or carefully following Agnes as she runs or drives across short distances. Sharp editing cuts between these fixed frames give the movie a feeling of beautiful claustrophobia. Everything is constrained and meticulous—orderly to the point of slightly disingenuous. It’s a visual representation of Agnes trying to pretend things are okay when they clearly aren’t.

Sorry Baby rolls time back to the year of the bad thing. It’s not shown on screen, but it’s described in terrible detail. And it passes, and people around Agnes move on, but Agnes never does. Scenes from subsequent years continue, and the movie stands as a reminder that four years isn’t very long.

It’s long, but it’s not very long. Especially in the wake of something so bad. Agnes has encounters with different people in their small town at different points over those years that show the different stages of accepting what happened, and how accepting doesn’t necessarily mean healing.

Sorry Baby is as witty and hilarious as it is gloomy and upsetting.

It’s not just a gloomy movie, though. Eva Victor has exceptional wit and comedic timing. Between embracing the awkward, making light of the terrible, and outright cracking ace jokes, there’s so much humor in Sorry Baby. It’s necessary. We can’t survive difficult things without a sense of humor. Kelly McCormack’s casting as Natasha, in particular, provides countless moments of levity.

Natasha is as brutally honest as she is uncomfortable to be around. It’s regularly at odds with Agens’ version of being curt and awkward. She adds a lot of humor but also triggers some of the movie’s most important payoffs throughout Agnes’ years post-trauma.

For as much as Sorry Baby is about the difficulty of moving on from something unimaginable, it’s also about how it feels when almost everyone around you doesn’t know how to respond. People on the outside try to ignore it or avoid it. The people on the tertiary level feel bad or scared and don’t know how to react.

Even the person closest to Agnes, Lydie, has her limit. She’s the perfect counsel in the aftermath for a time, but eventually Lydie has to move on with her own life, and even she ceases to understand just what Agnes is still experiencing.

The one other relationship Agnes maintains over the years is with a neighbor, Gavin (Lucas Hedges). He’s an awkward guy who’s at her beck and call. She uses him as a way to keep from being alone at her worst moments and to perhaps help heal from some of her fear of being around other people, too.

He’s imperfect, and Agnes has to learn that with time. Gavin is a great character for exploring aspects of Agnes’ recovery that often go undiscussed with even close friends, as they are part of an intimacy that usually remains unspoken.

The final scene of Sorry Baby is the most exceptional piece of writing and acting in a movie blessed with so much of it already. Every thread of dialogue and little moment of characterization culminates in this one scene most unexpectedly.

Sorry Baby is a reminder that sometimes, healing takes a long, long time. That’s hard, but it’s also okay.

It’s a testament to love’s place in the healing process and how it may not always look quite how it did before, but it’s essential to rediscover. The conversation at the end is so moving and hopefully portends more standout writing and directing from Eva Victor in the future.

Sorry Baby is as much a phenomenal tome on healing as it is an artistically beautiful, witty, and funny piece of pure filmmaking. Eva Victor is a true force in all of their roles in making this movie.

Sorry, Baby is playing now in select theaters and nationwide July 18th.