Movie Reviews
Woman of the Hour (2024) – Movie Review
Woman of the Hour, 2024.
Directed by Anna Kendrick.
Starring Anna Kendrick, Daniel Zovatto, Tony Hale, Nicolette Robinson, Autumn Best, Pete Holmes, Andy Thompson, David Beairsto, Tighe Gill, Kathryn Gallagher, Kelley Jakle, Matt Visser, Jedidiah Goodacre, Dylan Schmid, Rob Morgan, Denalda Williams, Jessie Fraser, Max Lloyd-Jones, Nancy Kerr, James Yi, Jessica Chaffin, Matthew Kevin Anderson, Darcy Laurie, and Taylor Hastings.
SYNOPSIS:
Sheryl Bradshaw, a single woman looking for a suitor on a hit 1970s TV show, chooses charming bachelor Rodney Alcala, unaware that, behind the man’s gentle facade, he hides a deadly secret.
Somewhere between serial killer thriller and dark comedy takedown of sexist showbusiness industry standards, Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut Woman of the Hour gets at some psychologically uncomfortable truths about surviving in such a misogynistic world (especially for the 1970s in which the story unfolds, separated into different years and character threads) and the deceptiveness of a highly intelligent sociopath (a chilling Daniel Zovatto.) More tantalizingly, the film presents the bulk of the narrative on the stage of a matchmaking game show for supreme thrills, sharply editing back and forth through time with clever transitions that, yes, leave one hanging and eager to return, but equally invested in the wraparound events connected to the general premise.
This story is also based on actual events, but Anna Kendrick is so confident, comfortable, and skilled in telling this story she knows she doesn’t have to drop that bombshell until the film is over. Working from a screenplay by Ian McDonald, one would be forgiven for assuming this was all a brilliant, fictional premise that places an aspiring actress on a cheesy dating show alongside a chauvinistic host (Tony Hale) who encourages the titular woman of the hour to dumb her intelligence down and play up physical beauty to make herself more appealing to the uneducated and slimy bachelors, with one of those three being a sly-tongued, manipulative, murderous maniac capable of masking that ugly side for just enough time to lure his prey into isolation and danger.
Anna Kendrick also plays that frustrated LA-based actress who has trouble booking gigs. As Sheryl, it also gives the well-known actress ample opportunity to seemingly inject a more personal connection into the character whenever venting about such notorious Hollywood sexism (whether it be individuals likely being blacklisted from roles for refusing nudity or the demeaning types of characters they are expected to play, even on a reality TV game show.) One can only assume this behavior was rampant more in the 70s and somewhat eliminated in modern times, but the point is still largely valid and effective.
Woman of the Hour is not single-minded, though. Jumping around before and after this portion of the narrative, the focus turns to Rodney, the previously mentioned serial killer who is undoubtedly strange and unkempt but with enough charm and photography skills to earn the trust of young women and men, typically promising them modeling fame and an opportunity to win some money. Other times, he is in a lucky position to help out an unassuming soul before conducting his disturbing kills, which occasionally switch to the victim’s perspective to make the scenes all the more unsettling.
A third perspective follows Nicolette Robinson’s Laura, an audience member watching the game show who instantly recognizes Rodney as the man who sexually assaulted and murdered her friend. This is the shakiest part of the narrative, as the film slightly tries too hard to make everyone from her initially reasonable boyfriend to front desk security guards play down her concerns and make her out to be crazy. As filled with urgency as Nicolette Robinson’s terrified and traumatized performance is, there is a disconnect between observing men being forced to behave uselessly to keep the mechanics of dramatized elements of this true story working and men’s more genuinely scummy personalities here.
That’s mostly nitpicking since Woman of the Hour is a suspenseful, heart-pounding exercise. It feels like it shouldn’t work, considering the narrative jumps backward and forwards, but it does, which is also a testament to the film making viewers deeply care about these characters, from the protagonist to the victims. Anna Kendrick has also clearly learned a lot over the years from acting, elevating tension through tense cinematography (working with Zach Kuperstein), such as a wide-angle tracking shot tapping into the heart-racing fear of being a woman walking alone at night. She also arguably delivers the best performance of her career, especially when her capacity to play by the host’s rules goes out the window, demonstrating her intelligence and putting the men in the hot seat with tough questions. Again, the scariest part is that the most dangerous, sadistic person in the room maliciously adapts to that, practically knowing what she wants to hear.
Where Woman of the Hour ultimately ends up is also thrilling and challenging, suggesting that, even if it is profoundly messed up, the greatest survival mechanism for women is outsmarting even the most calculated, despicable men.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com
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Movie Reviews
1986 Movie Reviews – Dangerously Close, Fire with Fire, Last Resort, and Short Circuit | The Nerdy
by | May 9, 2026May 9, 2026 10:30 am EDT
Welcome to an exciting year-long project here at The Nerdy. 1986 was an exciting year for films giving us a lot of films that would go on to be beloved favorites and cult classics. It was also the start to a major shift in cultural and societal norms, and some of those still reverberate to this day.
We’re going to pick and choose which movies we hit, but right now the list stands at nearly four dozen.
Yes, we’re insane, but 1986 was that great of a year for film.
The articles will come out – in most cases – on the same day the films hit theaters in 1986 so that it is their true 40th anniversary. All films are also watched again for the purposes of these reviews and are not being done from memory. In some cases, it truly will be the first time we’ve seen them.
This time around, it’s May 9, 1986, and we’re off to see Dangerously Close, Fire with Fire, Last Resort, and Short Circuit.
Dangerously Close
I would love to tell you what the point of this film was, but I’m not sure it knew.
An elite school has turned into a magnet school, attracting some “undesirables,” so a group of students known as The Sentinels take up policing their school, but will they go too far?
The basic plot of the film is simple enough, but there is an oddball “twist” toward the end tht served no real purpose and somehow turns the whole thing into a murder-mystery. Mysteries only work when you know you’re supposed to be solving them, and not when you’re alerted to one existing with 15 minutes left.
Decent 80s music, some stylistic shots, absolutely no substance.
Fire with Fire
Oh wait… I may want to go back and watch Dangerously Close again over this one.
Joe Fisk (Craig Sheffer) is being held at a juvenile delinquent facility close a high-end all-girls Catholic school. One day while running through the forest as part of an exercise he spots Catholic schoolgirl Lisa Taylor (Virginia Madsen) and the two fall immediately in love because… reasons.
This film is just so incredibly lazy. The ‘love story’ really can just be chalked up to ‘hormones.’
Last Resort
Once again I am baffled how Charles Grodin kept getting work so much through out the 1980s.
George Lollar (Grodin) is a salesman in Chicago in need of a vacation. He loads up the family and takes them to Club Sand, which turns out to be a swingers resort as well as surrounded by barbed wire to keep rebels out.
There are a lot of talented people in this movie such as Phil Hartman and Megan Mullally, but the film lets them down at every turn with half-baked ideas of jokes. Supposedly, Grodin rewrote nearly the entire script and I think that explains a lot about how this film feels like unfinished ideas. It’s a Frankenstein monster of a script with half-complete ideas that feel like they are from completely different movies.
Short Circuit
Lets just get this out of the way: What in the world was Fisher Stevens doing?
NOVA Laboratory has come up with a new series of military robots called S.A.I.N.T. (Strategic Artificially Intelligent Nuclear Transport). Following a successful demonstration for the military, Five is struck by an electrical surge and finds itself needing ‘input.’ After inadvertently escaping the lab, it wands into the life of Stephanie Speck (Ally Sheedy), who cares for animals and takes Five in. Dr. Newton Crosby (Steve Guttenberg) is trying to get five back, while the security team wants to destroy it.
Overall, the film is thin, but harmless. The 80s did seem to love a ‘technology being used for the wrong reasons’ theme, and this falls into that camp. What is mind-blowing, however, is Stevens as Ben Jabituya, Crosby’s assistant. Not only is he wearing brown face, but he’s doing a horrible Indian accent and later reveals he was born and raised in the U.S.
His whole character is mystifying.
Honestly, a couple of decades ago I may have recommended this movie, but it’s a definite pass now just for being offensive.
1986 Movie Reviews will continue on May 16, 2026, with Sweet Liberty and Top Gun.
By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer
Posted: May 8th, 2026 / 08:34 PM
AFFECTION movie poster | ©2026 Brainstorm Media
Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Jessica Rothe, Joseph Cross, Julianna Layne
Writer: BT Meza
Director: BT Meza
Distributor: Brainstorm Media
Release Date: May 8, 2026
AFFECTION is an odd title for this tale. While it is about a number of topics and emotions, fondness isn’t one of them. Obsession, definitely. Love, possibly. The kind of general warm fellow feelings associated with “affection”? No.
There have been a lot of movies lately in which characters – mostly women – are grappling with false identities and/or false memories imposed upon them, mostly by men.
Let us stipulate that the protagonist (Jessica Rothe) in AFFECTION is not an android or in an artificial reality. However, we can tell something is way off from the opening sequence. A car is stalled on a tree-bordered highway. Rothe’s character is lying face down on the asphalt beside it, possibly dead.
But then the young woman rises, dragging a broken ankle. She experiences a full-body seizure. Fighting to recover, she sees oncoming headlights and tries to run, only to be hit by a car.
The woman wakes up in a bed she doesn’t recognize, next to a man (Joseph Cross) she likewise is sure she’s never seen before. One big confrontation later, the man says his name is Bruce – and that the woman is his wife, Ellie.
Ellie insists that her name is Sarah Thompson, and she is married to someone else, with a son. When she sees her reflection in a mirror, she doesn’t relate to the face looking back at her.
Bruce counters that Ellie has a rare neurological condition that causes her to block out her waking life and believe her dreams are real. This is why they agreed, together, to move to this isolated house, without the kinds of interruptions that can hinder Ellie’s recovery.
The set-up is presented in a way where we share Ellie’s skepticism. But Ellie and Bruce’s little daughter Alice (Julianna Layne) immediately identifies Ellie as “Mommy!” Alice appears to be too young to be in on any kind of deception, so what is going on here?
AFFECTION eventually explains this via a helpful videotape, though it’s so convoluted that viewers watching on streaming may want to replay the sequence to make sure they understand the exposition.
Writer/director BT Meza musters a sense of menace and lurking weirdness, as well as making great use of his location.
We still have a lot of questions, many of which are still unanswered by the film’s end. It may not matter to the points AFFECTION is trying to make, but a better sense of exactly how all this started might help our investment.
As it is, despite a heroically versatile performance by Rothe, a credible and anguished turn by Cross and appealing work from Layne, we’re so busy trying to piece together what’s important and what’s not and how we’re supposed to feel about all of it that it can be hard to keep track of the action as it unfolds.
Agree or not, Meza’s arguments are lucid and illustrated clearly by AFFECTION’s events. However, the movie is structured in a way that becomes more frustrating as it goes. We comprehend it intellectually but can’t engage viscerally.
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RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — In this episode of 8News Reel Talk, digital producer Julia Broberg is joined by anchor Deanna Allbrittin and reporter Allison Williams to talk about “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
The hosts gave their reviews and assigned the following star ratings:
Deanna: ★★★★.5
Allison: ★★★.25
Julia: ★★
To watch more livestreams and digital video content, head to the WRIC+ Originals page. You can also watch full on-demand videos on your smart TV using the WRIC+ app.
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