The Horror of Patriarchy in Woman of the Hour

I watched Woman of the Hour last night. I was curious about the film for a variety of reasons. It began with Netflix’s promotions, since they were releasing the film on October 18. I asked my partner if he wanted to watch it together, which prompted him to look it up and note that the film has good reviews!

Then I saw a clip of an interview Letterboxd did with Anna Kendrick about her influences for the film, and that excited me to learn more about how she would build horror or dread in the film. She describes how Le Bonheur is an influence for her: 

“a really great job of creating that absolutely kind of terrifying, skin crawling feeling in a way that really feels like a magic trick. There are movies where, you know, even if you’re not really conscious as you’re watching it, you could probably explain why a certain sequence was so unsettling to you. And I love or hate – it’s always hard to describe the way that you’re watching something unfold in a way that’s so pleasant that you’re wondering how is it that I feel like I’m going to be sick when everything in this movie feels beautiful, lovely, saturated, warm. It’s like I want to be at that picnic, but also it feels like the stakes are really life and death. But specifically there’s a sequence where it’s like a kind of blending of the husband and his mistress, and those shots are really hyper composed and very deliberate, and so the reference in the film probably isn’t obvious but there’s a scene where two characters wake up next to each other and I wanted that sequence to feel almost perversely intimate. And again, I think of Le Bonheur and I think of the perverseness of the way that it’s presented versus the emotion underneath it. And what’s happening is this kind of disconnect, but the illusion of intimacy. It’s two people who are really lying to each other about what’s actually happening, but it’s like this girl is saying, ‘hey, if you get on board with this reality, we can both walk out of here, safe. Physically, emotionally, if we’re just on board with the same lie, we’re going to be fine’.”

Her description of her inspiration intrigued me, because it suggests that she really has to use film as a medium to convey what’s really going on.

If we think about this as teachers, you’re looking at the subtext of a scene.

And then in film, you’re asking students to consider the juxtaposition of what we see (the composition, mise en scene, editing, cinematography, etc.) with the subtext of the scene, the moment.

What is the effect?

What does it highlight?

And that’s really a rich opportunity for students to discuss and dissect. So from the outset, I was intrigued.

As I watched the film last night, I think it delivered on this promise of subtext to unpack.

You can see on the surface the world that Anna Kendrick’s character, Sheryl, is stuck in. She graduated from Columbia and is an aspiring actress in Los Angeles. We first meet her in the audition room where she’s subjected to a conversation between these two men, presumably the casting directors, about her acting… right in front of her.

This brought to mind, for me, the scene in La La Land where Emma Stone’s character, Mia, is auditioning and the casting director pauses her in middle of her scene at the height of her emotional expression so that she can address the assistant poking their head in the door. Hollywood views their actors and actresses as disposable, easily replaceable, not as humans. 

Sheryl might be viewed as subtly feminist, or at least as a character with integrity.

She doesn’t shy away from subtly jabbing at the casting directors, implying that they’re older than her, and maintaining that she has no interest in doing nude scenes and ignoring one of the mens’ unsolicited assurances that “I’m sure they’re fine”. She blank stares at the men, not glaring, but looking away and back again, creating an awkward moment allows us to notice how inappropriate the entire interaction is.

The scene also brought to mind the show, Minx, for me, since it takes place in the same time period but offers a stark contrast to how a feminist woman of the ‘70s might take aim at tackling the misogynistic and patriarchal culture of Hollywood.

Still, we observe her internal battle with her acting aspirations in tension with her values and integrity.

When she gets home from her audition, a neighbor and fellow aspiring actor that she runs lines with fails to notice any of Sheryl’s cues for him to leave her personal space. Later, when they grab a drink together, Sheryl is noticeably bothered when he moves to brush her hair behind her ear, but then ultimately she moves to diffuse the tension between them, agreeing to another drink that she was just refusing moments before. Ultimately we see her wake up in bed with him the following morning.

Is it her fault? Should she have just walked away and left? What kind of dynamic would that have created for her to have pissed off her neighbor and a fellow actor to run lines with? He seems to be doing well with his auditions, what if he badmouths her? Is she awful for giving in and sleeping with him? Why does she in that moment? Is there power that she’s taking back for herself in those moments? If so, what is it?

Over the course of the film, we can use this first encounter as a foundation from which to measure Sheryl’s character arc and growth.

When later she’s presented with another hair brushed behind her ear moment - how is her response different? And why? Narratively this is a very neat and elegant set of scenes to contrast.

Future Viewing Aspirations for Woman of the Hour:

I’m curious to watch Le Bonheur, as I have never seen it before. And maybe I’ll get to No Country for Old Men, too, since Kendrick references it as another inspiration for her directing of the film. I’ll also take some time in the future to dig more deeply into more of the scenes of the film, in particular unpacking the subtext and the power dynamics.

But for now I’ll leave you with this moment, when the character, Laura, whose friend was murdered by Rodney Alcala, recognizes him as a Dating Game contestant and retreats to the car to gather herself and her boyfriend comes to check on her: https://youtu.be/OCVOziwATCk?si=uYsJtQ-eoq2JeBRD

For me, this moment stuck out as particularly timely and relevant. Her boyfriend tries to honor her emotions, but even with the best of intentions, and logic, and reasoning, he unintentionally gaslights her. How sure are you? But you’re not positive. I’m just saying this guy might look really similar, right? I’m not saying that I don’t believe you, Laura. I just – I mean, if this guy did what you’re implying, then wouldn’t he be in jail and not in a TV show? I mean, it’s a big TV show, you don’t think they vet the contestants? Maybe it is the guy, right? Maybe the police, they looked into him and they cleared him.

Oof. Time and time again, as I’ve gotten older, and as teachers we’ve seen how much society perceives teaching should be, or what they think it is to be like - but when you see how things work and you see the systems from the other side… unless you come from a place of many privileges where you don’t experience the inequities and disadvantages that come as a result from the broken system, you just don’t know what you don’t know. Same thing here with Laura’s boyfriend. Of course it makes sense that a TV show would vet their contestants and do background checks, there’s no way a serial killer would be cast on a TV show.

Okay, then why are all these documentary series now coming out about the producer Dan Schneider of Nickelodeon in the ‘90s? Lou Pearlman the boy band producer? What’s going on with Diddy? And even more recently, think about Jenn Tran’s season of the Bachelorette - why wasn’t Devin Shrader’s prior restraining orders caught by the producers vetting contestants for the show?

Woman of the Hour might be a film about how the Dating Game serial killer continued to evade arrest and incarceration for many years, but it’s also an illustration of the different horrors of misogyny and patriarchy that exist in American society.