by Hannah Stainbank, Second Year, English
Woman of the Hour (2023) follows Sheryl Bradshaw (Anna Kendrick), a struggling actress who appears on the show The Dating Game in the hopes it will launch her into fame. In doing so she encounters Rodney Alcala (Daniel Zovatto), one of the show’s bachelors and a real-life serial killer in the 1970s, who appeared on a dating show in the middle of his killing spree. The plot weaves in the stories of his other victims and his eventual arrest. As Kendrick’s directorial debut, it is a bold and memorable challenge to the conventions of true crime.
Although undeniably a true crime thriller, this film pays little regard to a few notable pillars of the genre. For one, the film does not depict the tortured insides of the killer’s mind. In interviews Kendrick has noted a conscious effort not to spend time dissecting Alcala’s psyche, as this is both unknowable and detracts from the the central theme she wanted to highlight: how societal attitudes allow for the perpetuation of violence against women.
Similarly, there is little attention paid to how Alcala conducted and got away with his crimes. He is not depicted as a calculated genius for evading law enforcement for so long; in fact, his crimes seem sloppy and spontaneous. The film does this to drive home the point that it was a flawed society, and not his own intelligence, that allowed him to evade arrest.
Kendrick also does not care to show gratuitous scenes of murder and rape. Although the final moments of a few of the victims are shown, it is done with shots that are either extremely close-up or zoomed out. The camera does not linger on the violence, showing just enough to elicit a sense of terror and illustrate the magnitude of his crimes without becoming voyeuristic and indulging in excessive brutality. Instead, the main source of terror in the film comes from close-ups on the faces of Alcala and his victims before he assaults them. Zovatto skilfully shows the chilling moment when Alcala changes from presenting as a kind, sympathetic guy to a cold-blooded murderer. What is more poignant is the numerous shots of his victims in their moment of realisation that their situation has become dangerous. It is a feeling that resonates with many female viewers.
The most widely criticised element of the film is its use of a non-linear narrative, flashbacks and forwards, which many feel are too choppy. I’d defend this choice to a certain extent for several reasons: it allows the film to do justice to the victims by focusing both on those who escape him and those who don’t, giving us a sympathetic glimpse into their final moments. It shows the numerous and escalating ways in which women offer politeness when they are uncomfortable without feeling overstated or forced, and it keeps the narratives of his victims at the forefront. Choosing not to use a chronological structure thus allows the film to function as an anthology of violence against women, revealing the many instances of misogyny that have allowed this to be perpetuated across society.
Though, I do partly agree that the film is a little overstuffed. At times it felt that there were too many interwoven storylines to keep up with, at the expense of more emotional investment in fewer characters. In particular, I felt that Alcala’s workplace and the tension with his co-worker Mario (Dylan Schmid) was not given enough time to build a comprehensible or emotionally intense storyline, and it took attention away from the more intense and well-placed scenes that make this film so powerful.
Nevertheless, Woman of the Hour marks a promising shift in the true crime genre. By focusing on the experience of the victims and giving little attention to the psyche of the killer, the emphasis of the film remains on the prevalence of violence against women and how these attitudes are endorsed on many levels within society. I hope this will start a trend towards changing the genre and doing more justice to victims of gendered violence.
What did you think of Woman of the Hour?
