It’s been a year since I first saw “Woman of the Hour,” Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut, at its world premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. It still haunts me. The film, written by Ian McDonald, is inspired by the true story of how serial rapist and murderer Rodney Alcala appeared on ‘The Dating Game’ in 1978. Not only does Kendrick give a typically intelligent and spirited performance as Sheryl, an aspiring actress and the contestant who matched with him on that fateful day, but as a director she shows a great curiosity about the power of the gaze, both cinematic and human.

“You are beautiful,” Alcala says to all his victims, especially women on the margins of society. He’s a photographer. He knows the power of are look from his camera. Kendrick begins her film with a victim who was murdered in 1977. We hear her off screen before we see her. The first image of her is framed in Alcala’s lens. “Try to forget there’s a camera here,” he tells her. Kendrick then focuses her lens on Alcala’s face, with actor Daniel Zovatto’s eyes appearing as open pools of empathy, the tool he uses to lull women into a false sense of security. When he switches into predator mode, an overwhelming ferocity overtakes his eyes. Kendrick holds his face so the shift can happen sooner us eyes, placing us directly into the psyche of his victims.

Later in the film, Alcala and Sheryl go out for drinks. The date isn’t going well. Sheryl’s laughter has caused a change in the seemingly charming bachelor. In recovery mode, she says she doesn’t date much. He notes the irony of her going on a dating show. “My agent said this would get me noticed,” she says. “Did you feel seen?” he asks. The camera shows both in close-ups, framing the conversation as a duel. “I felt watched,” she admits. “How do you feel now,” he presses. “Fine,” she says, despite her visible discomfort. “Fine,” he answers mockingly. An ominous pause follows. He then continues, “You know, most people don’t like to be seen. They are afraid. Because you have to feel comfortable. You have to stop performing.”

Each woman in Kendrick’s film has a moment where she has to play “nice” to get through a situation. Sheryl has to navigate these types of performances many times throughout the film. Take, for example, the moment when game show host Ed Burke (Tony Hale, downplaying the sleaze perfectly) enters Sheryl’s dressing room and spews a barrage of casual misogyny and racism before telling Sheryl not to scare off the bachelors with her intelligence. He tells her to just smile and laugh, just as she did in another scene where two men openly debate her physical worth in front of her during a casting. Just as she does when she rejects the advances of neighbor/fellow aspiring actor Terry (Pete Holmes) over drinks. Just as Amy (Autumn Best, a stunner), a teenage runaway whose escape from Alcala ultimately led to his arrest, also uses a smile and a laugh to survive her violent encounter with him.

As the game show winds down, Sheryl asks if she went too far in changing the questions, effectively turning the entire misogynistic enterprise on its head. Her makeup lady assures her that this is not the case. “Whatever words they use, the question underneath the question remains the same,” she emphasizes. “What’s the question?” Sheryl asks. “Which one of you will hurt me?” the woman answers. This question remains at the heart of Kendrick’s film, as it is for most women who go through life in a world that often does not protect them from male violence. “I knew he was risky, but fuck it: everyone is risky,” says one of the victims, describing her ex-partner to Alcala as he photographs her minutes before he violently kills her.

The film’s investigation into the power of being seen, and being specific understood by being seen is most effective in three mirrored cases. During the filming of the game show, a woman named Laura (Nicolette Robinson, playing the role of an exposed nerve) has a visceral reaction when Alcala is revealed as one of the bachelorettes. She is convinced he is the man who killed her boyfriend in Malibu last year. As she hurriedly leaves the studio, she knocks over a monitor. During the commotion, the women lock eyes, but the blinding lights prevent Sheryl from receiving the message in Laura’s eyes. Later, on her date with Alcala, he tries to order a second round of drinks. Sheryl looks at the cocktail waitress and desperately nods ‘no’. The message is received and the woman says they are closed tonight. Near the end of the film, Amy, locked in Alcala’s car, watches a man in a truck when they are stopped at an intersection. Her eyes emit an urgent plea for help, but the man in the truck looks right through her as he drives on.

There is a universal language in the looks exchanged between women, especially when a dangerous man is present. I don’t know a single woman who hasn’t had such an experience, although unfortunately these situations don’t always end in a rescue operation. As I watched the film, I remembered an evening in my twenties when I hosted a dinner party with an older man, a professional acquaintance. He often gave off a strange vibe, but I was young and ambitious. I thought having friends over for dinner would protect me. But one by one my friends gave up. They didn’t pick up on the message I was conveying through my gaze. I got out of the situation before it got too dark, but boundaries were crossed when I was finally alone with the man, and I have never felt so unsafe in my life. This is a feeling Kendrick knows all too well, as she uses every cinematic tool at her disposal to express it.

Comparisons to David Fincher’s “Zodiac” are inevitable, and that would be fair, at least on a superficial level. Kendrick has created a slick 1970s thriller about a serial killer whose reign of terror lasted ten years. Fincher’s film is about the men whose lives became embroiled in an attempt to solve the mystery of who the Zodiac was and the toll this obsession took on their lives. Kendrick’s film uses Alcala to critique the society that enabled him. It’s about how society normalizes violence against women through seemingly harmless sexism and misogyny, ultimately paving the way for escalating violence. The imagery can be seen as a criticism even of “Zodiac” and the true crime films it spawned, which often seem to delight in recreating this violence.

Although we glimpse Alcala’s brutal attacks, Kendrick films them from a distance or in extreme close-ups, minimizing and obscuring them. She builds tension in these scenes through a soundtrack of ambient sounds, birds chirping in the wind, the hum of fluorescent lights and traffic on the street. Before the violence becomes sparkling or exploitative, she cuts off abruptly, so that the viewer becomes aware of his own voyeurism, which she can deny. Instead, she lingers on everyday moments of threat. The many times men touch Sheryl’s neck or hair without her consent. The way Laura’s friend immediately doubts and then questions what she knows for sure is true. The way the officers are charmed by Alcala and let him go, with a laugh and a smile.

Midway through filming her episode of “The Dating Game,” the makeup artist tells Sheryl, “You’re supposed to have fun. That’s the whole point. Say what you want.” Wouldn’t it be nice if life were that simple and that safe?

Now on Netflix.