Anna Kendrick steps behind the camera for the first time to take on misogyny and murder with Woman of the Hour, a chilling true crime tale debuting on Netflix starting Friday, Oct. 18. 

In September 1978, photographer Rodney Alcala was the winning bachelor on an episode of The Dating Game. What producers and viewers did not know was that he was in the middle of a killing spree that had already claimed the lives of several young women in Southern California. 

Weaving back and forth through time, Kendrick uses the taping of the infamous game show entry as an anchor point to underscore just how deceiving appearances can be. Backed by a sharp script and even more incisive editing, her directorial debut is a bracingly fresh take on the serial killer genre.

Along with directing, Kendrick stars as Cheryl Bradshaw, a struggling actress who schleps fruitlessly to auditions, where casting directors barely even look up from their notes to acknowledge her when running scenes. Desperate for work, she reluctantly takes a spot on the hit game show The Dating Game, in the hopes her appearance will spark more TV roles. 

After throwing the three male contestants unscripted questions, to the chagrin of host Ed Burke (Tony Hale), Cheryl chooses the charming and intelligent “Bachelor No. 3” Rodney Alcala (Daniel Zovatto). Anxious for the all-expenses paid trip, Rodney asks Cheryl for a drink right after the show. During this date, she can’t ignore the nagging feeling that something isn’t right with the newly minted game show winner.

In addition to the unsettling encounter Cheryl has with the murderer, whose victim count was estimated to be 130 by the time he died in 2021, Woman of the Hour depicts a handful of the atrocities Alcala committed. While these scenes are terrifying and can be difficult to watch, they certainly don’t indulge in brutality against these women and are intended to convey just how casual the transition from flirtation to violence can be at the hands of a monster. 

Zovatto is appropriately unnerving as the calculatedly charismatic creep, connoting confidence and conscientiousness atop his psychopathic impulses. In each of the sequences that show Alcala on the hunt for vulnerable women, Zovatto reveals aspects of his character that make him even more deplorable, but no less fascinating.

Concluding right at the 90-minute mark, Woman of the Hour does come across as somewhat underdeveloped despite its weighty subject material. Kendrick devotes a portion of the narrative to an audience member, played by Nicolette Robinson, who recognizes Alcala during the taping of the episode after a previous encounter left her shaken. I imagine her inclusion in the film is Kendrick taking artistic liberties, as there isn’t any evidence someone who had a brush with Alcala was in the audience for the show. But in comparison to Cheryl’s perspective of events and Rodney’s murderous interjections in the narrative, the scenes of Robinson’s character desperately trying to warn a top producer of The Dating Game about Alcala don’t resonate with the same level of intensity.

What Kendrick makes clear is how sexism of the era, the residue of which is still on display today, allowed murderers like Alcala to carry out horrendous crimes undetected. 

Using The Dating Game, a long-running game show that positioned women as prizes to be won, as a backdrop drives home the point that a literal serial killer can be championed if they say the right thing. 

During commercial breaks, Cheryl chats with a tenured makeup artist who quickly touches her up and imparts bits of wisdom for the nervous contestant. In the years she’s been on the show, she says the real question under all the different questions that are asked is, “Which one of you will hurt me?” 

Of course, the line takes on a more literal meaning in context, but even outside this story, it points to how unsafe women have been made to feel by men. It’s a premise Kendrick unpacks brilliantly as the lead actress and director of Woman of the Hour, an impactful evocation of quiet dread.

More new movies coming this weekend

• Coming to theaters is Smile 2, a horror sequel starring Naomi Scott and Rosemarie DeWitt, following a pop singer who begins to experience a series of increasingly disturbing and daunting events as she is about to go on a new world tour.
• Also playing in theaters is We Live in Time, a romantic drama starring Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh, telling the story of an up-and-coming chef and a recent divorcée who find their lives forever changed when a chance encounter brings them together.
• Streaming on Shudder is MadS, a one-take horror movie starring Lewkowski Yovel and Lucille Guillaume, involving a teenager whose night takes a surreal turn when he picks up an injured woman after driving back from seeing his drug dealer.