In “Sorry, Baby,” the defining moment of Agnes’ adult life happens off-camera, but it haunts nearly every other scene in the movie. A standout of the U.S. dramatic competition at Sundance, Eva Victor’s disarmingly funny, slow-to-unfold debut is less a film about sexual assault than it is a serious look at the process of rebuilding after such an experience. Sympathy merges with satire, and acceptance leads to questions (rather than the other way around), as Victor herself embodies a bright young woman who probably thought of herself as a dozen things — witty, independent, a sure-to-inspire future professor — but now must add “survivor” to that list.

A tall, willowy 20-something, Agnes is a brilliant literary mind who must rewrite everything, including her understanding of the word “brilliant,” after the professor (Louis Cancelmi) who’d freely offered such compliments makes a pass at her. “Do you think that’s why...