A Woman of The Hour
This tells the stranger-than-fiction story of an aspiring actress in 1970s Los Angeles and a serial killer in the midst of a year's long murder spree whose lives intersect when they're cast on an episode of the dating game. So I wasn't sure this was based on true events until after watching. It's very unsettling to watch this dude nonchalantly go about life interacting with all sorts of people, all unsuspecting that he's racking up the body count wherever he goes.
Daniel Zavato plays Rodney, the murderous charmer, and he simultaneously exudes creepiness and charisma. All throughout the film were shown brief encounters of Rodney with young women, showing us how he endears himself to his future victims and then violently and cruelly ends their lives.
Zavato is wonderful, even though the character is stomach-turning. I mean the normalcy that's displayed, it's disturbing, especially as we're given insight into his daily life, which includes a regular full-time job. Anna Kendrick plays Cheryl, a young woman looking to become an actress who ends up on the dating game, thanks to her agent just trying to get her exposure.
Now Kendrick is good in the role. There wasn't anything surprising in her performance. The consistency is good, but it's also not wildly dynamic. I mean if anything, she's kind of toned down just a bit from some of her other characters, even though she does still maintain a tiny bit of that sarcastic delivery. Now, whether this whole story plays out within the film, I'm actually a bit surprised that the dating game portion is the central focus.
While it wasn't an important aspect of the story, there's a much more compelling and distressing storyline that we watch play out, which also ends up being way more impactful in the long run. Maybe this film was Kendrick's way of getting behind the camera while also not relinquishing her love of acting, but for as fun as she is to watch, create just unscripted antics when she's on the dating game, and then her uneasy conversations with the serial killer, her whole portion could have been removed in favor of focusing then on other key elements within the story.
Through the dating game sequences, we're shown interactions from an audience member and her boyfriend, and the meaning and ramifications of what's discussed they're extremely pertinent to the core story, illustrating the lack of expediency and investigation from the police. Now, I thought these were excellent moments, even though the characters that we watch are complete strangers to us the whole way through. I was a bit shocked at the levels of brutality that were shown within Rodney's attacks.
We don't always get every single gory detail, but what we are privy to is harrowing and disturbing. I can imagine that if someone had ever had some sort of violent experience like those that are shown, this could trigger some PTSD. I think that also speaks to the direction and the vision for this portion of the storytelling.
It's important to see some of the terrible actions that were perpetrated, especially when their contrasts so drastically with Rodney's outward demeanor and presentation. He was disarming and mostly innocent looking. There were creepy smiles and smirks that sometimes gave it away for us as the audience, but in regular conversations, pretty much everybody was oblivious to the horrendous
violence that he was capable of.
The film is a relatively short one at 95 minutes. Really, I think there is so much more here to examine that could make it a thrilling crime story. By also delving more into other encounters, even avoiding the violence, we could watch how Rodney navigated through society unnoticed. And then the dating game portion, it wouldn't feel so forced within the narrative.
There are conversations that take place before the show begins and then during breaks that give insight, not only in the mindsets of the time, but also clues to what others were observing during the taping. So overall, the story, while exciting in spots and tents with dread and frustration, feels choppy, relying on snippets of events pieced together rather than a fully developed arc.
Daniel Zavato is a standout in this, capturing the living nightmare with a character who appears emotionally balanced, but is in reality psychotically unhinged and on a murderous rampage. Anna Kendrick showcases some excellent directing decisions, crafting the violence so it's impactful without being gratuitous, and also providing a well-rounded view of the killer at large.
While the narrative is intriguing, it lacks memorability, even choosing to display title cards at the end with information rather than craft scenes to play out. I won't really say it's a great movie. I'll rate A woman of the hour 5/10. There's so many other examples of serial killer stories that are compelling, exciting, and dramatic. This just isn't one of them.