You wouldn’t think a movie starring Anna Kendrick being cast as the bachelorette on The Dating Game would fit so well into an October horror movie watchlist… but here we are. This basic premise hides the fact that bachelor #3 was a serial killer – with a record – and this flick is both a surprise thriller and based on a real events.

It stars (and is directed by) Anna Kendrick as an actress looking for work in the late 70s… and how she (against her better judgement) gets cast on The Dating Game (which I assure you was a real thing). Meanwhile, the film intercuts through time with a serial killer and his victims.

This is based on a true story and you can tell because they play up the Dating Game angle but it isn’t otherwise structured like a regular Hollywood picture. Kendrick is the star but she’s not the hero… in that this killer was on The Dating Game but it wasn’t the beginning or end of his story. In reality, the film uses the game as a jumping off point to tell the real story. They grab you with the “could a serial killer really be a contestant on a dumb game show” premise and then give us the real horror.

It opens with a horrendous murder that has a unique existential nightmare angle. Something I’ve never seen before and I’d rather not think about again. It then it cuts to another slightly less nightmarish depiction of being an actress in a Hollywood audition.

But the real horror of the film is the 1970s. And how the system – be it the police or the producers of a vapid dating show – don’t take women seriously. And how much calculation you can see in two of the women’s eyes… how will they get out of a given situation without being murdered or molested?

The film has something to say without ever being direct about it. I admire the script and the actors who portrayed the victims and the killer. It’s a strong and assured directorial debut for Kendrick who had the good grace of not being the hero in her own film (even if she is the star).

Score: 83