Sorry, Baby
(2024 | USA | 103 minutes | Eva Victor)

Everyone was right: Eva Victor’s wondrously delicate and wry Sorry Baby is definitely the film of the festival. As producers, Barry Jenkins and Adele Romanski basically never miss.

Spanning several nonlinear chapters in the life of a people-pleasing English professor, Eva Victor’s wondrously delicate and wry debut feature is an incisive exploration of the ways that trauma ripples through a life and the slow ways it heals (and sometimes doesn’t). Set in a small coastal New England college town, we first meet Agnes (Victor) as her best friend Lydie (Naomi Ackie, Mickey 17) arrives for a long-overdue visit to the house they shared as graduate students. The bond of their friendship is instantly evident with a familiar shorthand that speaks volumes.

The weekend unfolds with revelations of exciting life developments and awkward dinners with former classmates. Always at the periphery of the tightly bonded friendship, though, are hints of a painful violation that shattered Agnes’ personal and academic life. We can imagine the pieces and put them together, but the story reveals itself in measured flashbacks to her student days before jumping forward again in time.

Subsequent chapters reveal the whole story, with each candid vignette unfolding with a soft touch and gentle humor. Rather than depict the core incident in detail, the camera is kept at a distance, focusing instead on the immediate effects of a betrayal and rocky road to recovery. Working as writer, director, and star in her debut feature, Victor instead gives the characters agency to divulge, disclose, and process on their own terms.

Through each hop through time, we follow Agnes as she experiences the unexpectedly transformational powers of the cuddly creatures found along the way, be it dear friends, surprisingly sensitive sandwich vendors, an abandoned kitten, or a sweet neighbor played by Lucas Hedges.

A must-see, sure to be in the conversation for the rest of the year.

Sorry, Baby played as an official selection of the U.S. Dramatic Competition at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. It is available for online viewing from January 30-February 2.