Displaying items by tag: Sorry, Babt=y movie

SORRY, BABY

US, 2025, 105 minutes, Colour.

Eva Victor, Noemi Acke, Louis Cancelmi, Lucas Hedges, John Carroll Lynch, Kelly McCormack, E.R.Fightmaster.

Directed by Eva Victor.

This is something of a demanding watch. It is often deadly serious. It is sometimes wryly comic. And, its audiences will not be surprised to learn that the writer-director, Eva Victor, born in Paris but moving with her parents as a child to the US, previously directed a television series, four episodes of Eva vs. Anxiety. Although her name is Agnes in this film, she is still victim as well as confronting anxiety.

This is a very frank film, focusing on identity, personality, relationships, sexuality.

Audiences have to be very alert as to the time sequences of the scenario. There are several headings indicating “The Year of…”. But, the screenplay moves around backwards and forwards during these title chapters, moving from one year sometimes back to another.

Agnes is an intellectual, participated in literature seminars and writing workshops, has completed a successful thesis, eventually offered an opportunity in the local college. In the past, she was a strong friend of Lidie (Noemi Ackie) who is seen eventually in a union with her partner, Fran, and their new baby. Also in the literature workshop is the insecure and jealous Natasha (Kelly McCormack), simmering with envy during classes, continually demanding attention.

And the attention demanded is that of the professor, Preston Dekker (Louis Cancelmi), praise for Agnes but soon becoming a sign of contradiction, Me Too# issues which take their toll on Agnes, compounding her anxieties, her loneliness, her need for affirmation, especially from a friendly neighbour, Gavin (Lucas Hedges).

This is definitely a film for women’s audiences, identification with Agnes, responses to Lidie, contrasting responses to Natasha, and a very interesting sequence where Agnes is called up for jury duty is and the prosecutor is caught up in a long discussion about Agnes’s state of mind and emotions. This contrasts with a sympathetic but unhelpful interview with College authorities.

And, one might also say, this is definitely a film for men’s audiences. Except for Gavin and the judge, the men, especially the professor and a doctor in a hospital sequence, a dramatised quite unsympathetically – challengingly for the male audience. But, unexpectedly towards the end, there is a pleasingly down-to-earth conversation between Agnes and Pete, an older man she encounters after pulling up in her car with a panic attack. His played by John Carroll Lynch and audiences, both men and women, will appreciate this sequence.

As might be expected, reviews and bloggers are divided about the impact of the film, some almost dismissing it as slight and self-indulgent or self pitying, others appreciating the raising of the male and female issues, and the handling of abuse.

But, and maybe this is something of a spoiler but worth saying, a final sequence where Agnes is left alone to mind the new born baby, holding her, talking to her, wonders aloud about her future and the world in which she will grow up, offers a very humane experience as Agnes says to the child, Sorry, Baby.