In the 1980s an American cartoonist, Alison Bechdel observed an unfortunate trend in pop culture. She noticed that most films had very less female representation; and when there were multiple female characters, the storyline almost always revolved around men, complimenting them and their plots. This redundant representation of females in various storytelling mediums motivated her to create the comic ‘The Rule’ in the comic strip ‘Dykes to Watch Out For’, in 1985. In the comic, two female characters talk about watching movies. In this discussion, one woman explains that she only goes to a movie if it satisfies the ‘three basic requirements’:
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It has to have at least two women in it.
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Who talk to each other
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About something besides a man
The other female character calls it ‘pretty strict, but a good idea.’ They eventually end up going home together after being unsuccessful in finding any films that check all their boxes.
This rule is known as the Bechdel Test, or as Alison prefers to call it the ‘Bechdel-Wallace Test.’ Bechdel was keen on crediting the idea for the test to her friend, Liz Wallace, who was heavily inspired by Virginia Woolf’s ‘A Room of One’s Own.’ This test has become a scale to measure female representation in fiction and popular culture and bring to attention the gender inequality in this paradigm.
In 2019, women accounted for about 51% of moviegoers. Out of the top 100 grossing films of 2019, 43 movies featured a female lead or a co-lead. According to the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University, male characters continued to dominate the big screen in 2018. Only 35% of films contained ten or more female characters in pivotal roles with an adequate number of lines, while the number was 82%— more than twice than females, for males.
Now let’s talk about how some of our favourite movies did on this test:
- Ratatouille: The animated movie lacked female characters as the only two significant female characters are Solene LeClaire, a food critic and Colette, the restaurant’s chef. Unfortunately, these women never interact. Result: FAIL
- The Avengers: Earth’s mightiest heroes appeared as a whole for the first time in 2013, shockingly the only female character that made into the team was Natasha Romanoff. Although it did have other female characters, they never hold a conversation. Result: FAIL
- The Hunger Games: This book adapted movie passed the Bechdel Test in the first scene itself when Katniss comforts her sister after a bad dream. And the interactions do not stop here, with the gradual development of the main protagonist without emotional dependence on men; Katniss goes on to have a sentimental relationship with Effie Trinket and Rue. Result: PASS
- The Social Network: The critically acclaimed movie that revolved around the social media prodigy, Mark Zuckerberg had many female characters. Yet again, they never speak to each other and have very undeveloped and weak characterisation. Result: FAIL
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Bridesmaids: The main cast is all women, and they have meaningful conversations with each other about almost everything but men. Result: PASS
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The Imitation Game: The movie about Alan Turing, whose code-breaking work helped the Allies defeat the Nazis. The film features an intelligent female character, Joan Clarke, who holds a conversation with her friend Helen, which alas, revolves around men. Result: FAIL
The test gained a lot of controversies because people started assuming that movies that failed the Bechdel test were automatically ‘bad.’ This fact is, however, untrue because this test never intended to comment about the quality of the movie. Critically commenting about a film can be done by its storyline and cinematography. While representation is essential, but you can’t just assign low ratings to a movie due to lack of significant gender portrayal.
A lot of successful and award-winning movies do NOT pass the test. Alison Bechdel’s favourite film Groundhog Day does not pass the test. She says, “Some of my favourite movies don’t pass the test at all. But I’ve made peace with it. I’m actually very happy about it because I feel like the general idea – that women should be treated as fully human people in a movie, just as they should be in life – is a really good idea.”
Interestingly; movies with formidable female characters like Ryan Stone in Gravity, Lara Croft in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Evelyn Salt in Salt, Lisbeth Sandler in The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo and Neytiri and Dr Grace Augustine in Avatar do not pass the Bechdel Test. Yet, it does not make these characters any less of a female icon or stop these movies from empowering the female youth. Reviewers cannot solely rely on the Bechdel test as the only criteria for assessing gender representation in the films.
Same goes the other way round, just because something from pop culture passes the test, doesn’t make it a pinnacle of female empowerment. Sir Mix-A-Lot’s hit song Baby Got Back passes the test. The song begins with two girls objectifying a black woman. They vilify her for flaunting what her mama gave her and eventually ended up slut-shaming her. And then Sir Mix-A-Lot begins rapping about how he likes women with narrow waists and large lower backs. Not female-empowering, but hey it still passed the test, right?
The Bechdel Test might not be a test that puts the seal of feminism on a movie, but it has helped improve something that had been missing in pop culture— female representation and the depth of their characters and storyline. Upon receiving a lot of backlashes, scriptwriters and producers realised the need for female characters and a well-written plot only for female characters. Hence, giving rise to a new trend of female-empowering movies.
The Bechdel Test is something that might’ve been a feminism check-in 1985, but with changing times, this is not the case anymore. It’s 2020, high time we move beyond the Bechdel Test, the bar isn’t that low anymore. This test has helped give birth to other tests which are primarily based on sexual orientation, ethnicity and race. It’s not only about the people on the screen, but also about people behind the screen that help make the movie. While the two female characters from Alison Bechdel’s comic strip might not have had an option in 1985, today they have a wide variety of films from which they can choose.