Woman of the Hour trailer: Anna Kendrick's directorial debut looks chilling and thrilling

Run, Anna Kendrick! That's what you will be saying while watching the new teaser trailer for the Academy Award-nominated actress' directorial debut Woman of the Hour. The thriller movie, which marks Kendrick's first time in the director's chair for a feature-length film, will be released on Netflix on Oct. 18, but the new first look has us counting down every last second.

Based on a true story, Woman of the Hour stars Kendrick as Cheryl Bradshaw, a woman appearing on the 1970s game show The Dating Game and inadvertently meeting serial killer Rodney Alcala. Later referred to as "The Dating Game Killer," Alcala was known to have killed at least five women, though the actual number of his victims couldn't be confirmed for sure.

Woman of the Hour trailer teases chilling scene

Daniel Zovatto plays Rodney Alcala in Woman of the Hour opposite Kendrick as Cheryl Bradshaw, and Netflix's newly released teaser trailer showcases the pair on an uncomfortable date. Rodney flirts with Cheryl, and she appears to be receptive to his charms, but she soon realizes her instincts regarding his behavior. When he asks the waitress for another round of drinks, she subtly shakes her head.

The rest of the teaser finds Cheryl walking back to her car at night with Rodney offering to walk with her. Before she can safely get into her car, Rodney asks her to recite her phone number. She already wrote it down for him, but he wants to double check she didn't give him a fake number. Clearly, she's scared, but she has to keep her cool. It's an unsettling and effectively chilling scene.

Watch the full teaser trailer in the video below!

The teaser trailer doesn't include any of the scenes that take place during The Dating Game, and that might be intentional. Kendrick spoke at length with Entertainment Weekly about the process of making her directorial debut and her vision for bringing this story to life. While she wasn't extensively familiar with the story, after researching, she realized the game show aspect was only one part of this tragic story.

"I think I was aware of the story in the way that I have found about 50 percent of the population to be aware of the story, which is to say, 'Oh yeah, I heard about that.' And really, what we've heard is once upon a time, there was a very violent, dangerous murderer who went on The Dating Game. But once I signed on to direct and I got to dive into some research and make tweaks, to me, the fact that he went on The Dating Game is the least interesting part of the story. We got to use The Dating Game as this framing thematic device about, how do you know who is a safe person and who is not?"

Anna Kendrick, director/star

Kendrick expressed that she hoped the movie underscores and challenges the casual victim blaming that has a tendency to undercurrent conversations about women experiencing abuse. As the director, producer, and star of the movie, Kendrick put in the work to make sure the story was told the correct way, making it entertaining for viewers but also ensuring the message was heard.

A trailer released in August 2024 by VVS Films features a closer look at Woman of the Hour and more of its scenes, including The Dating Game sequence and other horrifying moments leading up to Alcala's killings. Watch that trailer in the video below and stay tuned for Netflix's official trailer for the movie ahead of its release in October!

Woman of the Hour premieres Oct. 18 on Netflix.