Agnes (Eva Victor) is a literature professor at a New England university. She lives alone with a cat, haunted by her past. Through a series of flashbacks, the cause of her trauma is revealed and its terrible repercussions played out.

Some films you cannot summarise effectively. The above precis of Eva Victor’s exemplary feature Sorry, Baby is technically accurate but does not provide a fraction of the film’s full merit. If one leads with its full premise – a woman’s recovery after being sexually assaulted by her academic supervisor – it runs the serious risk of scaring off an audience averse to challenging social issues. If one emphasises how regularly and enormously funny the film can be, it risks ambushing the viewer when the more serious elements arise.

I can only impress upon you that Sorry, Baby is the best feature film I have seen so far from 2025. I went in without knowing anything about it, or its creator Eva Victor – who succeeds at writing, directing, and starring all at the same time. I came out knowing that I would be forcefully recommending it to everybody I know: friends, colleagues, readers, and strangers alike. This film is built on masterpiece territory, and I try to be very selective on when and for what I write that word so that you know when I do write it I really mean it.

There is so much to praise here. It is such a superbly confident work, whether that it is in Victor’s lead performance, or the bold use of a wide screen ratio for such an intimate story, or Lia Ouyang Rusli’s musical score. It is superbly edited, effectively condensing a long story into an efficient 104 minutes. The quality is in Victor’s sharply crafted dialogue, which manages to reflect numerous honestly drawn characters as well as showcase believable flawed behaviours without sacrificing likeability. Naomi Ackie is an absolute gem as best friend Lydie. Lucas Hedges is similarly impressive as dopey, loveable next-door neighbour Gavin. I swear Kelly McCormack deserves awards for her beautifully exaggerated, brittle turn as fellow graduate student Natasha; personal resentment has rarely been played as funny.

Really the most impressive element is the tone. It ducks and weaves, shifting back and forth from confronting to serious, from warmly charming to deliberately silly, but all time maintaining the same set of characters and circumstances. It takes a well-known trauma, albeit one rarely discussed with such directness, and fully explores its immediate and long-term consequences. Notably, it is a film about sexual assault that never directly shows that assault, and it is a film that palpably understands why not showing the central event is the correct artistic choice. More than once I was reminded of another masterful exploration of gendered assault: Kaouther Ben Hania’s 2017 drama Beauty and the Dogs, which achieves many of the same artistic feats for the same reasons. That was a savage, angry work – and rightly so – while Eva Victor includes both elements of injury and recovery.

That this film is as good as it is feels miraculous enough. That it also represents Victor’s debut as film writer and director just seems unimaginable. If there is any justice Sorry, Baby is going to mark the beginning of a long and hugely successful filmmaking career. This is your chance to capture it from the very beginning.

Sorry, Baby opens in Australian cinemas on Thursday 4 September 2025. Check your local cinema for session details.