Sorry, Baby
Cast: Eva Victor, Naomi Ackie, John Carroll Lynch
Writer and Director: Eva Victor
** & a ½ *’s out of Five
There is a scene near the end that had me laughing when I
shouldn’t have been. In this scene, our
main character is visited by a former colleague of hers. While in school together, this other girl was
clearly jealous that our protagonist got this big teaching job over her. The punch line comes when the jealous girl
admits to having sexual relationships with a mentor of both of theirs. Only because she thought it would help her
secure the job she wanted and it didn’t.
It went to the other girl instead and she is very jealous
It’s when this former peer just casually shrugs off having sex with this guy when it has caused our lead person such great trauma is what I found funny. It’s humorous, because one person’s tragedy is mundane to another and it’s that juxtaposition of what the other finds tragic is what was funny. For the one girl not getting the job was tragic. For the other hearing someone not be upset about the actions this guy did was tragic. Im sure this wasn't the intent of the scene but it almost reminded me of something I would see in an early Todd Solendz(Happiness) feature
Sorry, Baby is about a
woman who was sexually assaulted and is healing from her trauma. But the people involved in making it don’t
want you to know much in fear that some may get triggered at even the mention
of the word rape. It’s understandable and
honestly great that director Eva Victor doesn’t show the actual incident. You don’t need to see anything super graphic
to get the point that something bad happened to Agnes. But to not even mention in the trailer or synopsis’
the words sexually assaulted or raped is just down right irresponsible. This very review most likely will flagged or
possibly get taken down for using those words because they might offend someone. It seems that by avoiding certain words
people will just think that this type of Violence will just go away, but it
wont.
There is a scene after the attack when both Agnes(Eva Victor)
and her friend Lydie(Naomi Ackie) visit a doctor. He is very kindly trying to get certain
details so that he can cure her and they both treat him like he is somewhat
responsible for what happened. There are moment when it’s revealed she didn’t
go the cops because in her mind, she isn’t quite sure on what to think and that
does make sense. I almost felt that if
the structure was told chronologically instead of disjointed. The character arch would have made more
sense.
When the incident is described, It’s extremely vague and yes I understand that trying to recount such violence is very difficult for some. But when she is talking about how uncofterableshe felt when his hands got too close. Never once did I hear her say, stop. Now, in no way does that mean this sort of behavior is allowed. I just never got the notion from other scenes that Agnes is afraid of any type of confrontation. She seems very capable of saying no.
The out of order story telling technique is pretentious and I would have preferred a story that told you straight up what the bad thing was instead of treating it’s audience members like little kids. The acting from everyone is quite good and I am somewhat looking forward to what Eva Victor has for their next project. We just need to stop being afraid and walking on egg shells about certain words.
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