Great Ways to Fail the Bechdel Test

Some comic by somebody talking about the Bechdel Test.

In the last year the Bechdel Test has received well-deserved scrutiny. The test is simple. Does your movie have:

a) two named female characters

b) who talk to each other

c) about something other than a man.

If the movie passes A, B, and C, it’s instantly a feminist and progressive. If it fails, it’s a piece of misogynist garbage.

Does that sound wrong? That’s because it is; I made up those consequences. Culturally, we’ve never decided what passing or failing the Bechdel Test means about an individual movie. The test has become dogma for some people, however, and once their numbers grew we got the reasonable pushback. Are Pacific Rim and Gravity truly faulty films? Are they anti-feminist? Are they the enemy for not being feminist enough?

Look: I like this test. It’s dumb, but it’s a tool that’s provoked me to check my own fiction. Novelists use this thing all the time, even if our industry has a slightly better batting record than Hollywood. Since taking it to heart I’ve written about the same number of women (they’ve always been big in my work), but I’ve been more conscious about having them interact with each other. My page count of my second novel is approximately one quarter women talking to each other, and having just admitted that, let me promise they’re mostly talking about flesh-eating robots and flying cities, so please don’t close this tab and run from your browser screaming.

Martin, Grossman, Butcher, Abercrombie: all the bravest female voices.

The Bechdel Test is fundamentally useful in at least one way. We’ll talk about that starting next paragraph, but living in the now, let’s confess that it’s unhelpful in at least one significant way: criticizing an individual film. Failing the Bechdel Test is never the reason a movie sucks. In most flawed movies, it’s one of a litany of shortcomings, and it’s usually not one of the integral shortcomings. And there are many good movies that shouldn’t have had anyone question whether the screenwriter should strive to pass the test. Milk is not an inferior film for lacking two women of significant agency talking about something other than the center of the bio-pic. Alien 3 is actually an interesting movie for featuring only one woman, and flawed as its execution is, in a series that puts so many angles on women, that film uses isolation among male convicts for provocation.

And yes, I realize Alien 3 is not a good movie, and this means there are flawed movies where screenwriters still shouldn’t have striven to pass the test, but alas we’re in the next paragraph and that means we need to talk about the fundamental value of the test. In-fighting about the Bechdel Test tends to derail from its helpful function: criticizing an endemic failure of entertainment industries.

Though I still think Daredevil was okay.

If you compare the number of conversations between men about anything in film to the number of conversations between women about anything in film, you immediately find a gross disparity. Shrink the field to conversations about something other than a man, and further by speakers who are important enough to be named characters, and the results are depressing. It’s not one movie’s fault. It’s systemic, and things like Bechdel’s criticism make us more aware. Rather than succumbing to rants, we need to act on our awareness to rectify this.

Before you tell me that you don’t want stories about anybody of any gender, and that you instead only want good stories, understand that I want good stories about everything. We only get good movies about women if we have lots of movies about women, because making good art is hard, and that means lots of people need chances to make it. Generations of girls deserve better than that. If we only get Elektra and Catwoman, then probably we’ll only get Elektra and Catwoman. Yeah, I’m nauseous too.

Ask me sometime about my major gripe with the Bechdel Test and I'll probably whine about the omission of women talking in groups. We all have our nits to pick. The test doesn’t tell you how many gay characters are in popular media, or how many women are writing and directing what you consume. That’s because it’s the test tests for one thing. That part of the Torah wouldn’t have been so useful as “The One Commandments”. It’s just a thing to have in mind as we consume and create art. And it’s only a good thing if we put it to good use.

Bathroom Monologue: Missing: one short-haired cat burglar

MISSING

one short-haired cat burglar

lost little kitten, no collar

wears leather two sizes too small

may be in possession of rare coin collection

REWARD offered for coin collection

cat burglar need not be returned

photo of body acceptable

REWARD DOUBLED if she’s cut in half

warning: claws v. sharp