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Sorry/Not Sorry Uses the Fall and Rise of Louis C.K. to Prove Cancel Culture Isn’t Real

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If you’re looking for an unbiased telling of comedian and self-confessed sexual harasser Louis C.K.’s fall from grace and rebirth into a men’s rights monarch, Sorry/Not Sorry is not the documentary for you. While the 90-minute film, which premieres locally at this weekend’s Double Exposure Film Festival, features interviews with C.K. enablers, supporters, and fans, it rightly focuses on the people most affected by his actions—the women he violated—and comedy’s inability to hold him accountable.

There’s no need to put “alleged” before C.K.’s crimes: He’s admitted, publicly, to them—masturbating in front of (or on the phone with) young women comedians whom he’d led to believe he was mentoring.

Co-directed by Caroline Suh and Cara Mones, the New York Times-produced documentary is told in chapters. Viewers are quickly introduced to C.K. via clips from his original, self-deprecating stand-up about women and pitiful men. As Variety’s Alison Herman notes, C.K.’s comedy, often critical of himself and men in general, helped endear him to women audiences. Parks and Recreation co-creator Michael Schur, who cast C.K. in the sitcom and admits to bringing him back to the show despite knowing the rumors circulating about C.K.’s behavior, speaks of C.K.’s brilliance, as do a handful of other comedians and critics. 

But, before 10 minutes pass, viewers are confronted with the accusations made by various women, C.K.’s statement—“These stories are true”—and hordes of mostly men defending his actions and declaring C.K. didn’t really do anything wrong. A clip of Matt Damon (one has to wonder why Damon was ever asked to meditate on C.K. in the first place) captures the actor saying “well, we can work with that,” in response to C.K.’s admission. “Like what the hell else are we supposed to do?” 

This is the crux of the film, and, really, the #MeToo movement. We’ve—allegedly—created a space for survivors of sexual misconduct to come forward and share their trauma, but that’s where the pavement ends. Instead of being believed, survivors, many of them women, are often discredited, attacked, or written off by the media. Meanwhile, perpetrators rarely own up to their crimes and are even more rarely held accountable. Their loved ones go on the defensive, victim-blaming or downright denying any wrongdoing. The rupture creates a near uncrossable schism that asks how do we move forward? What is an apology? Where is the line? And do we find any kind of redemption? We have no answers.



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