bechdel_test | Entries tagged with bechdel rule two fail

Write-up courtesy of

The setup of the movie is thus: four magicians, all of whom are awesome in their solo acts, are Recruited To Do Something. This isn't a spoiler; it's the premise, which leads to them teaming up and being awesome and also robbing banks and shit (all in the trailers). We have a mentalist, a classic slight-of-hand trickster, an escape artist, and a pickpocket/misdirectionist. As they start to do their shit, they are pursued by an FBI agent, an Interpol agent, a professional debunker, and a dude who got robbed.

Of the characters listed above, two are female. They never speak to each other. No, never. No, not even then. There are two secondary female characters, who also never speak to each other (one is there purely to be a pretty status symbol). The female magician is the only one who never gets an awesome moment where her field of magic, her specialization is both key to the plan and saves the day. Literally the first thing one of the other magicians says to her is "you're pretty."

YOU'RE PRETTY.

More at the link.

lilacsigil

This movie is a great big fail, which is a pity because the one major and two supporting female characters are all shown as well-realised, competent characters with agency. They just never talk to each other.

( Spoilers for who appears in the movie and when, minimal plot spoilers )

noblealice

In Time is a futuristic world where time has become currency. While I really liked the movie, and there were many female characters with names, they never speak to one another.

( spoilers )

holyschist

Complete Bechdel fail. Not only are there no named women, and no women with dialogue, you barely even see women in the background. The major secondary female character/love interest from Rosemary Sutcliff's novel has been removed (given how they changed the direction of the movie, I can see why, but).

(I did enjoy the heck out of it, but I wouldn't say it's a very good movie either.)

ilthit

Not even close to a pass.

( spoilers )

How to Train Your Dragon has two supporting female characters: Astrid, the love interest, and Ruffnut, one of the comic relief characters. Despite the fact that they are both in dragon fighting classes together, I can't recall a single instance in which they ever speak to each other. Astrid speaks almost solely to the hero, Hiccup, and Ruffnut to her male twin brother, Tuffnut. The film is very much a horse-and-his-boy story, substituting "dragon" for "horse;" what dialogue doesn't involve Hiccup in some way isn't very substantial, no matter who's saying it.

That said, I personally found the film enjoyable despite the fact that it fails the Bechdel Test at rule 2, and I hold out hope that if it does well enough to garner sequels, future movies might be Bechdel passes.

azurelunatic

Spoilers below. If you go see this movie, don't go seeing it under the illusion that it's likely to pass the test. This is an action movie about the original detective buddy pair, set in London of the late 1800s, so it failing the test is unsurprising.

( I mentioned spoilers, right? )

foxfirefey

No women talk to each other in District 9 at all; there are no major female characters, and as far as I could tell no female alien characters (but who can know?), although due to subtitle labeling during the brief interviews of women the movie does end up having more than one named woman.