The first aspect of writer-director-star Eva Victor’s remarkable debut, Sorry, Baby, that I adore is how she attempts—and fails—to conceal a tryst with her neighbor in her role as young professor Agnes.
Lydie (Naomi Ackie), Agnes’s best friend and fellow former graduate student, is staying at her charming New England home. A knock on the door occurs just as we are beginning to know each of these folks. When Lydie responds, Gavin (Lucas Hedges) is standing outside, perplexed. Agnes dashes over to pretend that this isn’t the first time he’s confused her house for his.
As she pushes him away, she adds, “God bless your lost soul.”
The storyline of Sorry, Baby revolves around Agnes’s horrific event, which takes place in the chapter labeled “The Year With the Bad Thing.” However, it would be incorrect to use that negative aspect to characterize Sorry, Baby or its lone protagonist. The humorous and sensitive moments that endure in the face of harsher events are the ones that count in this remarkably well-developed debut.
Victor performed improv and created humorous social media videos prior to her script for Sorry, Baby attracting producer Barry Jenkins. And Sorry, Baby is the instantaneous display of a disarmingly unconventional new voice due to the extent to which she has successfully tapped her sharp sense of humor and full-bodied rejection to cliché.
The movie is told out of chronological order and is divided into five chapters that span Agnes’s five years of existence. That in and of itself is a means of rearranging the negative aspects of Sorry, Baby. The main tenets of Victor’s film are friendship, healing, and stasis.
In a sense, Sorry, Baby’s initial tone is the dominant one. As natural as their protectiveness of one another is their humorous chemistry, Agnes and Lydie (a fantastic Ackie) are best friends. When their former thesis supervisor is mentioned over a dinner with their former graduate students in literature, Lydie clasps Agnes’ hand beneath the table.
We learn why in the second chapter, “The Bad Thing.” Preston Decker (Louis Cancelmi), their lecturer at an undisclosed New England liberal arts school, is affable and insightful. His betrayal is all the more devastating because he appears to appreciate Agnes and acknowledges her brilliance. Victor’s camera waits outside as day gives way to night as one of their meetings is abruptly moved to his house. We only pick up with Agnes as she gets into the car and drives away, pale and appalled.
Afterward, Agnes’s trauma from the rape manifests itself in surprising ways and at unexpected times. alongside Lydie. going to the doctor. on jury duty. with a stray feline. The movie emphasizes how individuals around you, whether they are friends or strangers, have a choice of empathy, and these interactions—some touching, some insensitive—are Agnes’ difficult method of digesting what she went through. Most poignantly, John Carroll Lynch portrays a man who discovers she is suffering a panic attack and kindly sits down with her in a parking lot in the chapter The Year With the Good Sandwich.
Agnes does not process her experience in the manner that a character in a film might be expected to, such as through quick catharsis or retaliation. She goes to her neighbor’s house to borrow some lighter fluid as part of her intermittent, frequently ridiculous recovery. Lydie is essential. In many respects, this depicts a friendship—and one that is especially lived out. A story about sexual assault is not as much of it. Victor’s film avoids the definitions that are typically associated with such a subject, much as Agnes is humorously and self-deprecatingly opposed to convention. Being unique turns into a form of survival.
The Associated Press
(Sorry, there is explicit language and sexual content in Baby.)
SORRY, BABY
At the AMC Boston Common and Coolidge Corner Theatre, it has a R rating.
Grade: A-
