WEBVTT - What is the Bechdel Test? 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:07.200 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:11.200 --> 0:00:13.600 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's 0:00:13.760 --> 0:00:16.680 Chuck and Jerry's here too, and that makes this Stuff 0:00:16.720 --> 0:00:17.479 you Should Know. 0:00:19.880 --> 0:00:25.680 The podcast that's right movie Crush adjacent. Today. I put 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.440 this one together in big thanks to Mark Mancini of 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:33.880 HowStuffWorks dot com. A great article in Vogue from Ridka Seth, 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:38.440 really good article from a guy named Douglas Lamon from 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:42.440 Collider and also Collider from Thomas Butt and the Mary Sue, 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.640 Danielle Baranda, all good stuff about the Bechdel Test. And 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:50.400 we would be remiss if we didn't mention right out 0:00:50.400 --> 0:00:53.600 at the gate that on our own iHeart Network, we 0:00:53.640 --> 0:00:57.320 have a great podcast called The bech Del Cast that's 0:00:57.360 --> 0:00:59.800 been around for a long time now, They've been with 0:00:59.880 --> 0:01:03.280 us for years. Yeah, and this is hosted by Caitlin 0:01:03.320 --> 0:01:07.360 Durante and Jamie Loftus and it talks all about movies 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:11.200 kind of through the lens of the Bechdel Test or 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:12.160 the Bechdel problem. 0:01:12.720 --> 0:01:15.640 Yes, and you can get that wherever you get podcasts. 0:01:16.959 --> 0:01:17.760 Very well done. 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:20.120 So what are we talking about, Chuck? I mean, I'm 0:01:20.200 --> 0:01:21.840 sure there's a lot of people out there who know 0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:25.399 all about this still interesting. There's other people who maybe 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:27.080 heard of it but don't quite know what it has 0:01:27.120 --> 0:01:29.360 to do. Maybe they're confusing it with a litmus test. 0:01:30.560 --> 0:01:32.600 And then other people are like, I've never heard those 0:01:32.640 --> 0:01:34.199 two words together in my life. 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:37.080 Well, maybe I think it might be fun if we 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:40.640 just sort of work through the Casablanca example, okay, and 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:43.280 illustrate it and then give sort of the definition. Does 0:01:43.319 --> 0:01:43.800 that work for you? 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:46.199 It works for me. I just have to find that. 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:49.120 Page, okay, Can I start while you look? 0:01:49.400 --> 0:01:49.680 Sure? 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:53.000 So, the movie Casablanca, one of the all time greats, 0:01:53.800 --> 0:01:56.960 is on the AFI one hundred years one hundred movie 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:01.800 quotes list, with six different quote in trees, making it 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.000 the most, you know, the most number of quotes from 0:02:05.000 --> 0:02:07.880 a single movie on that list. And I still have 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:12.000 not seen all of Casablanca. I watched a lot of 0:02:12.040 --> 0:02:14.720 it not too long ago. Didn't finish it. 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:16.960 Oh yeah, I meant too. 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:18.760 It wouldn't because I didn't like it. But I will 0:02:18.800 --> 0:02:20.600 say this, and I know we talked about it right 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:23.239 after I saw it some but I thought it was good, 0:02:23.240 --> 0:02:24.680 but I wasn't like, oh my god, this is the 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:25.720 best thing I've ever seen. 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:27.200 Okay, yeah, I vaguely remember talking. 0:02:27.440 --> 0:02:29.600 Yeah, like plenty of movies from that era. I like 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:35.600 much more. But I even know here's looking at you, kid, Louis. 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:37.880 I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:41.200 Will always have paris of all of the gin joints 0:02:41.200 --> 0:02:42.720 in all the small towns, or all the towns in 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:44.840 all the world. She walks into mind like, these are 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:48.960 all just in the sort of if you'd like movies, 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:51.160 you've probably heard these, even if you haven't seen the movie. 0:02:51.400 --> 0:02:54.760 Yes, But as a little aside, no one actually says 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:57.760 play it again, Sam in that movie. Nope, they say 0:02:57.760 --> 0:03:02.320 play it Sam, or play say play as time goes 0:03:02.360 --> 0:03:05.120 by a couple of other variations, but no one says 0:03:05.120 --> 0:03:06.079 play it again, Sam. 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:07.120 They don't say that. 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:09.440 The thing is the reason we're talking about this and 0:03:09.480 --> 0:03:13.720 how it relates to the Bechdel test is that Casablanca. 0:03:13.760 --> 0:03:16.760 It's a great movie. There's a lot of great lines 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:19.800 in it. Some of them are uttered by Lauren Bacall, 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:25.080 but none of them are between two women. If Lauren 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:28.840 Becall's character ils Lund is speaking them, she's speaking them 0:03:28.880 --> 0:03:30.880 to a man, and then all the other men are 0:03:30.880 --> 0:03:33.160 speaking to other men or to ilsu Lund. There's no 0:03:33.400 --> 0:03:39.640 woman to woman conversation in Casablanca, which you might say, like, so, well, 0:03:39.680 --> 0:03:43.000 actually there's a big fat explanation to that. So we're 0:03:43.000 --> 0:03:47.160 gonna dive feet first into it. So open up patriarchy 0:03:47.200 --> 0:03:49.280 because we're coming in. 0:03:51.200 --> 0:03:53.560 A quick statistic for you just to sort of illustrate 0:03:54.000 --> 0:04:00.440 part of the problem is usc Annberg Annaberg Annenberg. I 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:03.960 knew I'd get there. Their Inclusion Initiative did a study 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:07.200 and there were a think tank that looks at diversity 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:09.680 in arts, and they saw that just thirty three point 0:04:09.720 --> 0:04:14.440 one percent of speaking roles period in the top one 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:19.120 hundred grossing movies of twenty eighteen, and that was, you know, 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:22.760 thirty three percent, like seventy or sixty oh gosh, help 0:04:22.800 --> 0:04:25.680 me out. Sixty seven percent of speaking roles in the 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:27.920 one hundred grossing films were men. 0:04:28.440 --> 0:04:32.000 Yes, that was a big increase though from two thousand 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:36.279 and seven, where twenty nine point nine percent went to women. 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:40.440 Yeah, I being facetious about three percent ish. 0:04:40.520 --> 0:04:43.120 And one of the reasons I saw is that that 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:49.880 the majority of supporting roles, especially like one scene, like 0:04:49.960 --> 0:04:52.600 speaking part just a bit part just kind of like 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:56.840 very quick roles. Those are almost always are very typically 0:04:56.880 --> 0:05:00.760 filled by men. Right. I saw it described as does 0:05:00.800 --> 0:05:04.440 your protagonist report a crime to a CoP's probably a man. 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:06.839 Do they get stitched up? Doctor's probably a man. The 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:09.600 President's probably a man, and the soldiers that he commands 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:13.720 are likely men too. And that's really true. And I 0:05:13.760 --> 0:05:16.160 was reading an interview with a person named Kate Hagen, 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:19.560 who is the director of community at the Blacklist, which 0:05:19.600 --> 0:05:21.680 is a place where if you're a screenwriter you can 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:26.240 submit your stuff for like really good feedback, I believe. 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:29.320 Well, you know the Blacklist is it's a list of 0:05:29.360 --> 0:05:32.800 the best screenplays in Hollywood that didn't get produced. 0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:34.800 Oh I didn't know that. I thought it was like 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:37.320 a kind of a work shopping website. 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:40.279 Well, they may have, like you know, made it into something, 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:42.840 but the Blacklist is like, you're the ten best scripts 0:05:42.839 --> 0:05:44.360 that didn't get made into features. 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:46.760 Oh that's cool, Okay. Well, she's the director of community 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:49.000 there and she's like, once you see this, you can 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:52.240 never unsee it. And she also points out that it's 0:05:52.279 --> 0:05:55.200 not just bit parts going to men, but crowd scenes 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:59.520 are very typically mostly men, and mostly white men, which 0:05:59.600 --> 0:06:01.719 in some way cases like if the thing's set in 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:07.640 rural Iowa at a men's club, sure that would make sense. 0:06:07.680 --> 0:06:09.840 But if it's like New York City, that doesn't really 0:06:09.839 --> 0:06:13.200 make sense. And the thing is chuck. It's so common 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:16.000 that it's just really easy to look right past and 0:06:16.040 --> 0:06:18.400 not really think about. But what Kate Hagen is saying 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:20.240 is like, once you do start to notice it, you're 0:06:20.279 --> 0:06:22.000 getting to notice it from that point on. 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:25.560 Yeah, for sure. All right, So all that was a 0:06:25.640 --> 0:06:28.120 nice little build up to what is the title of 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:31.800 this podcast, which is the Bechdel Test, named after a 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:36.960 graphic novelist named Alison Bechdell who had this long running 0:06:37.520 --> 0:06:40.640 comic strip called Dykes to Watch Out For and in 0:06:40.640 --> 0:06:42.440 one of the entries in nineteen eighty five, so this 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:45.080 is a long time ago, it was called the Rule 0:06:45.480 --> 0:06:48.640 and then subtitled with Thanks to Liz Wallace and in 0:06:48.680 --> 0:06:51.800 one of those panel In one of those panels, one 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.240 of the characters says, I have this rule. See, I 0:06:54.320 --> 0:06:57.320 only go to a movie if it satisfies three basic requirements. 0:06:58.040 --> 0:06:59.719 One it has to have at least two women in 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:04.200 it who too talk to each other about three something 0:07:04.240 --> 0:07:08.720 besides a man, and that was in this cartoon sort 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:11.240 of lived quietly for many years, and then in the 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:16.000 two thousands it really got spread around the internet, especially 0:07:16.040 --> 0:07:21.040 in feminist communities online, especially in film websites for film 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.320 buffs and stuff like that, and it became known. Even 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:28.160 though Alison Bechdeal likes to credit her friend Liz Wallace 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.560 by calling the Bechdel Wallace Test, more people know it 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:33.000 as the Bechdel Test. 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:36.920 Right, and actually, later on, in a blog post from 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:39.680 twenty thirteen, Alison Bechdel said, you know, I think my 0:07:39.720 --> 0:07:42.640 friend Liz Wallace actually might have gotten the idea from 0:07:42.720 --> 0:07:47.800 Virginia Woolf, who wrote, quote, all these relationships between women, 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:51.560 I thought, rapidly recalling the splendid gallery of fictitious women, 0:07:51.840 --> 0:07:54.600 are too simple, And I tried to remember any case 0:07:54.640 --> 0:07:56.760 in the course of my reading where two women are 0:07:56.800 --> 0:08:00.360 represented as friends. Almost without exception, they are shown in 0:08:00.400 --> 0:08:03.360 their relation to men, and that really is kind of 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:06.600 the basis of the Backfelt Test. It's kind of a 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:10.360 little more refined and a little more stripped down, but 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:15.920 the idea is that women characters typically are there to 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:19.960 support the men, or are deferential to the men, or 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:22.680 are subservient to men in some way, shape or form, 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:26.200 even movies that feature like a female protagonist. 0:08:26.680 --> 0:08:28.480 Yeah, and we'll get to a couple of those in 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:31.120 a minute. But if it wasn't clear enough from that 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:35.160 comic strip, the very three basic rules are, it has 0:08:35.200 --> 0:08:37.160 to contain and this is whether or not it passes 0:08:37.240 --> 0:08:40.720 or fails. It's a past fail thing. Two female characters. 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:43.800 And then later on it was added that they should 0:08:43.880 --> 0:08:46.640 be you know, named characters and not just like and 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:50.200 we breeze by two women talking in a cafeteria. Briefly, 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:54.160 that's rule number one. Rule number two is the characters 0:08:54.160 --> 0:08:55.960 have to talk to each other and just each other 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:59.800 in a scene, and that their conversation has to be 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:04.320 it can be about anything on planet Earth, except for 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:06.920 a conversation about a man or a group of men. 0:09:07.160 --> 0:09:09.480 Even beyond planet Earth. They want to talk about galaxies 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:13.120 that would count. Galaxies, you know, talk about the Big 0:09:13.160 --> 0:09:14.600 Bang that would count too. 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:18.760 It seems so easy, and it's so amazing, And we'll 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:23.280 get to statistics that so many films sorry, flunk this test. 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:26.520 Right, that's the point, Like, it's it sounds really easy, 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:32.040 but it's not. It's extraordinarily hard for Hollywood. It turns out. Yeah, 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:36.080 And I think, Chuck, this is a pretty good place 0:09:36.160 --> 0:09:38.120 maybe for our first ad break. What do you think 0:09:38.760 --> 0:09:53.680 I say toats. 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:50.400 And stuff with Joshua job. 0:09:51.240 --> 0:10:11.400 Stuff, you shine up? All right, So, now that we've 0:10:11.440 --> 0:10:13.600 explained what the Bechdel test is, I think it's a 0:10:13.640 --> 0:10:16.240 good time to say that we're totally aware of the 0:10:16.280 --> 0:10:19.880 irony of a podcast that doesn't pass the Bechdel test 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:23.160 talking about the Bechdel test. But I hope you guys 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:25.920 have been listening to us strong enough to not rake 0:10:26.040 --> 0:10:27.240 us over the calls for it. 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:29.760 Well, you can't do that to a podcast. 0:10:29.360 --> 0:10:33.360 Though, I think you can in some way, shape or form. 0:10:33.360 --> 0:10:35.760 There's some sort of Bechtel tests that you could apply 0:10:35.840 --> 0:10:37.160 to podcasts, for sure. 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:41.040 So then every podcast hosted by one or two people 0:10:41.160 --> 0:10:42.640 that are guys fail to test. 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:44.599 Well, we'll get into that, Chuck, because a lot of 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:47.880 people say the Bechtel test is great in theory, but 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:51.640 it really kind of doesn't make sense sometimes. 0:10:52.000 --> 0:10:54.040 Yeah, all right, Well, let's go back in time, at 0:10:54.120 --> 0:10:58.200 least to the studio era where not a lot of 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:01.880 films were passing the Bechdel test. We talked about Casablanca. 0:11:01.920 --> 0:11:04.960 Of course, huge movies like Citizen Kane did not pass 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:07.840 the Bechdel test. And a lot of movies, as you 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:10.920 might expect from the you know, the thirties and forties, 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:14.720 may not pass this test because movies have gotten more inclusive, 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:17.320 more progressive, and stuff like that over time in general. 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:21.480 But this is not like a problem from the bygone era. 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:26.720 AFI did a separate list one hundred movies American movies 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:30.040 that is a release from nineteen sixteen to two thousand 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:34.440 and one. That's a lot of movies, and seventy of 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:38.120 I'm sorry, seventy of those one hundred, which is almost 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:41.520 said seventy percent, it is seventy percent failed the Bechdel test. 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:45.080 Only thirty percent of the top one hundred movies through 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:46.120 two thousand and one passed. 0:11:46.920 --> 0:11:50.000 Yeah, and it kept going even beyond that though. I 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:52.679 think that one of the examples they give is Thor 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:58.040 colin Ragnarok, which is from twenty seventeen. It has a 0:11:58.080 --> 0:12:02.600 female villain, a female superhero, so you've got a hera 0:12:02.800 --> 0:12:07.319 in Valkyrie. I think it's directed by tai Ka Ytt, 0:12:07.720 --> 0:12:09.679 and it still fills the Bechdel test. 0:12:10.200 --> 0:12:10.680 Yeah. 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:13.200 I mean, if it was ever set up for success, 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:15.840 that movie was set up for success, and it still 0:12:15.880 --> 0:12:20.680 didn't pass the Bechdel test because Hara and Valkyrie never 0:12:20.760 --> 0:12:23.840 speak to one another in that movie. 0:12:24.080 --> 0:12:27.040 Yeah, here's another study, and this is from twenty eighteen 0:12:28.600 --> 0:12:30.480 when they looked at so you know, you wonder about, like, 0:12:30.480 --> 0:12:33.480 what about quality films? I get it if you know, 0:12:34.120 --> 0:12:37.800 if some of these dumb, stupid, big action blockbusters may 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:41.240 not be as advanced or progressive, but surely these Oscar 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:44.839 winners for Best Picture are in. The twenty eighteen study 0:12:44.840 --> 0:12:49.760 from BBC found that less than half of Best Picture 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:54.800 winners past the Bechtel test, and since twenty eighteen they've 0:12:54.800 --> 0:12:57.520 done much better. There have been six films since then. 0:12:58.559 --> 0:13:01.959 In five of the six passed it. So Nomadland, Coda, 0:13:02.800 --> 0:13:07.080 Everything That Everywhere, All at Once, and Parasite and The 0:13:07.120 --> 0:13:10.520 Shape of Water all passed and only Green Book failed. 0:13:12.360 --> 0:13:16.400 Tiss green Book, But also that's just Best Picture. The 0:13:16.440 --> 0:13:20.520 nominees did a little a little worse in twenty twenty. 0:13:21.080 --> 0:13:24.760 The Irishman nineteen seventeen and four versus Ferrari didn't come 0:13:24.800 --> 0:13:30.400 close to passing. Joker Marriage Story and Once upon a 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:32.560 Time in Hollywood, which, by the way, Joker, dude, that 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:34.720 was such a terrible movie. Did you see it? 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:35.560 I did. 0:13:35.920 --> 0:13:37.120 I hated that movie. 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:37.640 You did? 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:40.440 I did? And I'm sorry anybody out there who yums it, 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:42.040 I'm yucking it. I'm sorry about that. 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:44.439 Now we covered this at your personal opinion. 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:49.079 Once upon a time in Hollywood, you can make some arguments. 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:51.640 Each one has something that's like, well, yeah, that kind 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:53.200 of is, and then somebody can say, well, it's not 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:58.040 really and then Little Women, Jojo, Rabbit, and Parasite all 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:00.839 are definitely past the Bechdel test. 0:14:01.440 --> 0:14:03.400 Yeah, I mean there can be, and there often are, 0:14:04.160 --> 0:14:07.120 and I think it's meant to be debated. It's it 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:09.560 can be as cut and dry as like, literally, do 0:14:09.679 --> 0:14:12.959 any two women speak right? Because people will say, like, well, 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:15.520 there's that one scene where those two even though they're 0:14:15.559 --> 0:14:18.439 named characters, it was super fast. Like I think that 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:21.520 the spirit of it is have a real sort of 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:26.840 conversation of substance, even though and again this is it's 0:14:26.880 --> 0:14:30.880 a it's an online sort of movie test thing for 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:34.040 people to argue over to a certain degree. Sure, so 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:37.360 well what we'll get, like you said, we'll get into 0:14:37.400 --> 0:14:40.440 the ins and outs of it, and I know I'll 0:14:40.440 --> 0:14:41.480 start to get into that again. 0:14:41.720 --> 0:14:46.640 So one really roundly man. My brain just fell out 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:49.920 of my ear about ten minutes ago, I think. Yeah, yeah, 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:53.840 one widely sighted movie that kind of shows like the 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:57.440 Bechdel Test is not all encompassing. Is Jackie Brown? 0:14:57.920 --> 0:14:58.360 Yeah? 0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:00.440 Was that? Did Tarantino wreck that? 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:02.840 Okay? Great? Great movie? 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:04.800 It is a great movie. Well, it was adapted from 0:15:05.120 --> 0:15:06.680 Leonard Elmore? Right? 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:07.080 Yeah? 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:13.000 Okay? Or Elmore Leonard? It was adapted from Leonard Kamma Elmore. 0:15:13.040 --> 0:15:15.880 I mean, do you know how many people just went yeah, 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:20.200 I know, I know, coolier jets everybody. So Jackie Brown 0:15:20.400 --> 0:15:24.360 has Pam Greer in it as the lead Jackie Brown 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:29.000 and the whole movie, right, Comma, Pam, you don't forget 0:15:29.040 --> 0:15:32.640 the comma. Yeah, it's like the New Colon, but she 0:15:32.760 --> 0:15:34.880 plays Jackie Brown and Jackie Brown. The whole movie is 0:15:34.880 --> 0:15:40.160 about Jackie Brown just being this ba who I can't remember. 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.960 She's like setting up this whole I think an arm 0:15:44.040 --> 0:15:46.360 steal or something to help somebody get out of something. 0:15:46.800 --> 0:15:49.240 Is that right? I haven't seen it in years. 0:15:49.800 --> 0:15:52.520 Let's just say she's always one step ahead of the 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:55.520 man in the movie, right, So she's smarting them at 0:15:55.520 --> 0:15:55.960 every turn. 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.360 Yeah, to use a very tired phrase. She's a she's 0:15:59.400 --> 0:16:02.600 a feminist icon in this movie, and yet throughout this 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:05.880 whole movie, she never once has a conversation with another woman. 0:16:06.480 --> 0:16:10.800 So technically it fails the Bechdel test, although anybody who 0:16:11.360 --> 0:16:14.800 has any kind of feminist tendencies and watch Jackie Brown 0:16:14.920 --> 0:16:17.960 probably is very happy with that movie, including Alison Bechdel 0:16:18.120 --> 0:16:20.920 as well, who said, like, I love that movie, but 0:16:21.000 --> 0:16:23.720 it definitely fails a Bechdel test, but it's still a 0:16:23.720 --> 0:16:27.320 really great movie. And that's something really like too important 0:16:27.320 --> 0:16:30.280 to remember is just because a movie fails the Bechdel 0:16:30.360 --> 0:16:33.760 test doesn't make it a bad movie. And just because 0:16:33.800 --> 0:16:36.160 a movie passes a Bechdel test certainly doesn't make it 0:16:36.200 --> 0:16:38.920 like a feminist icon type movie. 0:16:39.600 --> 0:16:42.280 Yeah, for sure. I mean there have been movies that 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:47.040 passed that you might be very surprised, like Goodfellas. That 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:49.600 one is another debatable one, but technically that passes the 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:52.960 Bechdel test, even though you're probably like, who else besides 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:56.000 Lorraine Breco was even in Good Fellas as far as 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:58.480 women go. But there are a few, And there's the 0:16:58.480 --> 0:17:02.240 one scene where all the mob wives get together and 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:05.000 they're having conversations with one another, and they are named. 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:08.400 But again it's still not like these great substantial conversations. 0:17:08.440 --> 0:17:12.840 Can I throw at another couple surprising examples? Sure, American 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:18.120 Pie two. Yeah, Show Girls passes, and then my favorite 0:17:18.119 --> 0:17:23.920 example is Weird Science, where two horny teenage boys make 0:17:24.240 --> 0:17:28.960 a beautiful woman, literally objectify a woman, and yet two 0:17:29.000 --> 0:17:31.959 girls have a conversation about how beautiful that woman is, 0:17:32.200 --> 0:17:34.400 so it passes the Bechdel test. 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:40.879 In some movies that are surprising that failed, Avatar James 0:17:40.880 --> 0:17:45.960 Cameron's first dive into whatever that world is. What's it called? 0:17:46.960 --> 0:17:48.080 I don't know. I still haven't seen. 0:17:48.520 --> 0:17:50.280 Oh I even saw the new one, even though I 0:17:50.359 --> 0:17:53.240 kind of bag on this movie CI World. One thing 0:17:53.520 --> 0:17:56.560 to remember about Avatar is that it had a couple 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:59.480 of really strong female leads. It was zoe's Aldona's character 0:17:59.840 --> 0:18:04.040 and of course Sigourney Weaver's character, and James Cameron historically 0:18:04.920 --> 0:18:09.480 writes strong female leads from the Terminator to the Abyss, 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:11.800 and you know, he just says a strong history of 0:18:12.080 --> 0:18:15.560 working with strong female leads, and that certainly was a 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:19.400 case in Avatar. But Zoe Seldona and Sigourney Weaver don't 0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:23.280 talk to each other. Pandora. That's it on Pandora. Yeah, 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:26.480 that's the name of the world. And there are some 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:29.480 women kind of here and there talking to each other, 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:31.560 but it sort of falls in the category of like 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:32.960 they're not named characters. 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:36.680 Yeah, another handful of examples that don't pass, but really 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:40.080 are still you know, they have very strong female characters 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.600 and well defined ones La La Land. Oh yeah, Arrival. 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:46.720 I think that's Amy Adams, right, Yeah, great movie. Yeah, 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:51.920 it really is. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Gravity didn't 0:18:51.960 --> 0:18:55.879 talk to anyone though, No, that's true, but Gravity. Yeah, 0:18:55.920 --> 0:18:58.720 that whole movie is just basically Sandra Bullock trying to 0:18:58.760 --> 0:19:01.960 figure out what the heck to do in space. Yeah, 0:19:02.480 --> 0:19:05.280 and the reason why is like that it doesn't pass 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:07.840 the Bechdel test because there's basically no other female characters. 0:19:07.880 --> 0:19:10.720 But there's almost no other characters at all anyway. 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:12.080 Yeah, just clooney basically. 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:16.639 Yeah. So it's not exactly like a perfect measure, but 0:19:16.720 --> 0:19:20.639 the point is is to say, like, again, this is 0:19:20.680 --> 0:19:24.679 a really low barrow we're setting here, and yet most 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:29.400 movies don't pass this test, So what are we doing here? Everybody? 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:32.680 That's really ultimately the point and purpose of the Bechdel test. 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:35.080 Yeah, can I name a couple of others? 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:37.520 Oh yeah, this is one of the fun parts for sure, since. 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:40.680 We're just naming movies. A movie that passed two movies 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:45.560 that pass one is Hitchcock's Rear Window. Hitchcock, on the 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:49.160 other hand, of James Cameron, is known for having very 0:19:49.200 --> 0:19:52.879 problematic relationships with his leading ladies off screen. Oh yeah, 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:55.000 that you know, border well on that border on, that 0:19:55.080 --> 0:19:59.080 delve into psychological abuse of these women, you know, to 0:19:59.080 --> 0:20:02.760 try and get a performance out of them. He has 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:05.560 has cast a lot of female leads, but I wouldn't 0:20:05.560 --> 0:20:08.119 necessarily say that he has ever been known as like 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:14.000 a feminist filmmaker. But Rear Window has a pretty good 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:19.200 like subplot of Grace Kelly's character Lisa and Thelma Ritter 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:25.040 Ridder's character Stella, who's the nurse to Jimmy Stewart, sort 0:20:25.040 --> 0:20:27.399 of getting together to investigate this crime. You know. The 0:20:27.400 --> 0:20:30.240 whole premise of Rear Window is that they have witnessed 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:35.000 a crime out of the window looking into another window 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:37.000 of these like New York apartments where you can kind 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:40.080 of everyone sees each other all the time, right, and 0:20:40.119 --> 0:20:43.240 so they kind of team up as investigators, which you 0:20:43.240 --> 0:20:45.400 know wasn't the most common thing back then. 0:20:46.200 --> 0:20:48.200 No, And I think that's another thing that the Bechdel 0:20:48.280 --> 0:20:51.959 Test reminds us is that things are more complicated and 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:58.120 nuanced and layered than something like past fail pro feminist 0:20:58.160 --> 0:21:02.560 anti feminists like things. Things are often a lot more 0:21:02.600 --> 0:21:07.240 wrapped up in a lot more wax than it appears 0:21:07.280 --> 0:21:09.399 on the surface. And also, I think one of the 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:13.560 other things that reminds us is like, just say, because 0:21:13.560 --> 0:21:17.600 of the person Alfred Hitchcock was off screen, doesn't mean 0:21:17.680 --> 0:21:20.439 that the movies that he made didn't have strong female 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:23.919 characters and can't be enjoyed for that reason too, you know. 0:21:24.200 --> 0:21:26.399 And also I want to go on record, I'm just 0:21:26.440 --> 0:21:29.400 going to put myself out there. Weird Science is a 0:21:29.440 --> 0:21:31.680 great movie. 0:21:33.600 --> 0:21:34.919 I haven't seen in a long time. I loved it 0:21:34.960 --> 0:21:35.320 back then. 0:21:35.560 --> 0:21:39.800 I saw a couple of years and it's I think 0:21:39.840 --> 0:21:41.760 better now than it was when I was a kid. 0:21:42.320 --> 0:21:46.119 What was that weird deal in that movie? Though? Where 0:21:46.200 --> 0:21:49.040 the uh the guy from the Hills have Eyes and 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:50.679 the bikers crashed that party. 0:21:51.280 --> 0:21:56.280 I think they they left the little thing that brings 0:21:57.119 --> 0:22:00.600 whatever they want to life. I think on some mad 0:22:00.760 --> 0:22:03.080 or something like that or maybe on the movie. 0:22:03.320 --> 0:22:06.720 So that was explain Yeah, I think I just don't 0:22:06.720 --> 0:22:07.119 remember that. 0:22:07.520 --> 0:22:09.840 It's not explained. They just show what's happening and then 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:12.040 those guys show up and I don't remember where they 0:22:12.040 --> 0:22:14.680 came from. But it wasn't just out of. 0:22:14.640 --> 0:22:17.160