Bechdel Test- Gender Bias in Movies

[Penumbra]

Another thing worth pointing out, which is a bit more subtle, is the shallowness of typical strong female characters.

Here's a great article explaining it:
Why Strong Female Characters Are Bad for Women | Overthinking It

As this thread has pointed out, women are often underrepresented in broadly popular movies. Sometimes to an almost hilarious degree.

Sometimes, it seems when men try to fix that problem and create "strong female characters", they improve the situation slightly but it's still goofy and unbalanced.

-Having a token strong female character seems to be expected as sufficient. Like if there's 20 guys and 1 strong young hot woman that's also a love interest to one of the male characters, then that's cool, because it's diverse. She has a gun too! Even though women represent 50% of the population, and most movies in general do not rely on the protagonists brute strength to win the day. And often if there's a strong female character she still needs help in the third act and otherwise isn't the central protagonist. Like, Star Wars is okay 'cause it has Leia, or Lord of the Rings is okay 'cause Eowyn put a sword through that guy's face, or the Avenger's is cool because Black Widow is in it.

-An undeveloped, overpowered (in combat, intelligence, or whatever), hot, young secondary female character with limited screen time from the man's point of view is not a "strong woman". It's a caricature of a strong woman; the perspective of a woman from a certain type of male writer's point of view. Real, complex, interesting characters are flawed and dynamic. There's no shortage of flawed, dynamic, complex, interesting male characters in movies. But women are often weak, or under-represented in numbers, or exaggerated into powerful but rather undeveloped physically attractive characters. Let's have some more complex and interesting female characters that do not revolve around central male characters and primarily interact with them. Even sufficiently complex and developed secondary female characters would be welcomed. Scientists, explorers, sometimes fighters, leaders, dynamic helpers, teachers, narrators, protagonists in general, etc. (Several examples are given in the linked article.)

 

[MysticSang'ha]

Hey, you know Kill Bill volumes 1 and 2 totally pass the Bechdel Test.

The Bride talks with Vernita Green, Go Go Yubari, Sofie, O-Ren Ishii....all kinds of female protagonists and antagonists throughout both movies that aren't about a man.

I particularly loved the exchange between The Bride and the hired assassin in Volume 2 right after The Bride discovered she was pregnant, where both women had their guns aimed squarely at each other and were negotiating what to do next.

I also LOVED the dialogue right before and during the duel in the snow between O-Ren Ishii and The Bride. They talked about the sword, dying in such a beautiful environment, and how a caucasian girl likes to play with samurai swords. The entire fight scene, the cinematography, and the dialogue is incredible with female bad-*** characters who have depth, complexity, and a history of their own together as former assassins working in the same group.

It's another reason why I really love watching the Kill Bill movies repeatedly. I had a "girls night" at our house with a few friends of mine who identify as staunch feminists, and though they were hesitant to watch the movies for different reasons (violence or assumption that it was going to be like a Charlie's Angels kind of film), they all came out of it high-fiving each other and marveling at how great it was to see not only females as main characters in protagonist and antagonist roles, but that we saw female minor supporting characters that helped the plot along.

We had pecan pie with our post-film discussion, which was filled with sighs of relief that female-dominated action-movies exist with style and substance.

And the great thing is that women weren't the only fans of the movie. This film has had a very wide appeal in its audience. But you're right, Lyn, that quite a number of films targeted for mass appeal don't pass the Bechdel Test. I always remember telling husband that there were things about a bulk of Hollywood movies that just didn't sit right with me, and that I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Once I discovered the Bechdel Test, I shared it with my husband, and we have since on occasion talk about how it scores with Bechdel.

 

[methylatedghosts]

Honestly, I've never really thought about the role gender plays in those films that I love . I'm sure that some of those films would fail that test, however what genders the characters are, are hardly important to the plot or to the ideas and themes in the films.

Waking Life, for example, features a lot of some guy wandering around getting talked at a whole lot. The important parts in the film are in the monologues, not in who delivers it. I'm not even sure if anyone is actually named ...

Having said all that, yes, a lot of films are severely lacking in female representation. Guys need good female role models too!

 

[Badran]

I'm not surprised to see the number of movies, particularly popular and successful movies that didn't pass the test. I always disliked something i perceived, which is that romantic comedies seem to be almost the only genre in which females are given a close shot of a balanced representation.

There are plenty of stories made out there that would work equally well whether the hero were a male or female, most stories would actually, but of course it's much more often made about a man rather than a woman. All it takes for this to change is for enough producers, script writers and directors (particularly the first two) to take that step more often.

I think there is a good amount of successful attempts, so i wonder why it isn't done more. It could be the number of male writers, directors and so forth Vs. the number of females, or it could be that there is a perception (true or false) that a movie is likely to make more money if the hero is a man. Not really sure.

 

[Penumbra]

I see.

I didn't think such a thing would become so popular with female audiences.

As strange as it may sound, I've known females who hold extremely misogynistic ideas themselves and believe that all women must also support those ideas, so it wouldn't surprise me if some females found such depictions of women as subordinate and entirely dependent on males to be acceptable.

Well that all gets rather broad.

-The author of Twilight said her faith influences her work. She's a Mormon. Organized religions generally have a history of promoting gender roles and are usually led by men. That's a whole other discussion, though. Far more broad than the point of this thread.

-If women are constantly exposed to media that has a setting that can otherwise be fairly gender-balanced but chooses to mostly ignore them anyway (Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, super heroes, etc.) or treat them as damsels in distress (Twilight, many action movies, lots of Disney movies until very recently, etc.) then that's what we're going to come to expect. Usually dramas are the main genre where we can find decent percentages of female characters.

-Characters like Hermione from Harry Potter or Katniss from Hunger Games are helpful. Hermione was smart and brave, but also flawed, know-it-all, and therefore complex and developed. Katniss was smart and good with archery, had a somewhat distant and unemotional personality with people she didn't know, and had to figure out how to overcome some of the physically stronger male characters and the other female characters.

And to those that asked about Twilight, here's an example of a quote that exists in multiple places online:

"Hermione taught me to be brave. Taught me that I'm more than what people say. And I can make things happen. Bella Swan tried to teach me that I cant be someone without a man."

Media isn't just a reflection of culture. It also helps guide culture. Girls grow up watching and reading all of these various things, with no shortage of interesting and dynamic male characters but a relative shortage of interesting and dynamic female characters outside of certain niches.

 

[Aquitaine]

Another thing worth pointing out, which is a bit more subtle, is the shallowness of typical strong female characters.

Here's a great article explaining it:
Why Strong Female Characters Are Bad for Women | Overthinking It

As this thread has pointed out, women are often underrepresented in broadly popular movies. Sometimes to an almost hilarious degree.

Sometimes, it seems when men try to fix that problem and create "strong female characters", they improve the situation slightly but it's still goofy and unbalanced.

-Having a token strong female character seems to be expected as sufficient. Like if there's 20 guys and 1 strong young hot woman that's also a love interest to one of the male characters, then that's cool, because it's diverse. She has a gun too! Even though women represent 50% of the population, and most movies in general do not rely on the protagonists brute strength to win the day. And often if there's a strong female character she still needs help in the third act and otherwise isn't the central protagonist. Like, Star Wars is okay 'cause it has Leia, or Lord of the Rings is okay 'cause Eowyn put a sword through that guy's face, or the Avenger's is cool because Black Widow is in it.

-An undeveloped, overpowered (in combat, intelligence, or whatever), hot, young secondary female character with limited screen time from the man's point of view is not a "strong woman". It's a caricature of a strong woman; the perspective of a woman from a certain type of male writer's point of view. Real, complex, interesting characters are flawed and dynamic. There's no shortage of flawed, dynamic, complex, interesting male characters in movies. But women are often weak, or under-represented in numbers, or exaggerated into powerful but rather undeveloped physically attractive characters. Let's have some more complex and interesting female characters that do not revolve around central male characters and primarily interact with them. Even sufficiently complex and developed secondary female characters would be welcomed. Scientists, explorers, sometimes fighters, leaders, dynamic helpers, teachers, narrators, protagonists in general, etc. (Several examples are given in the linked article.)

I like how in the article the author lists bullet points of what kinds of female character traits she'd like to see more of in media, and one of them is:

"That are crazy, like everyone (male or female) from Neon Genesis Evangelion." :biglaugh:

 

[Penumbra]

Honestly, I've never really thought about the role gender plays in those films that I love . I'm sure that some of those films would fail that test, however what genders the characters are, are hardly important to the plot or to the ideas and themes in the films.

Waking Life, for example, features a lot of some guy wandering around getting talked at a whole lot. The important parts in the film are in the monologues, not in who delivers it. I'm not even sure if anyone is actually named ...

If the gender is unimportant to what a character is, then all the more reason that statistically the characters should end up fairly balanced, depending on the setting. Or at least not woefully imbalanced.

One thing I'm trying to point out in this thread is that maybe you haven't really thought about the gender of your favorite characters because chances are, a great many of them are your own gender. Now imagine that a large chunk of your favorite movies don't even depict one instance of people of your gender talking with each other, and that in general your gender tends to consist of secondary characters. You'd likely notice it more.

Consider trying to think of 2-3 movies that you like a lot where two men don't speak to each other. Because I can list lots of movies that I like where two women don't ever speak.

Lots of these broadly-targeted are movies where gender is largely irrelevant, like you said. The movie E.T., for example, just barely passes the test with one brief conversations between a mother and a daughter, yet there are countless male/male conversations.

Having said all that, yes, a lot of films are severely lacking in female representation. Guys need good female role models too!

I agree!

 

[InformedIgnorance]

I think you're clearly overestimating it and/or assuming that women have less of a practical place in linear, event-focused stories.

PERHAPS the former, though I think I have at least explained my reasoning, but where on earth do you draw the second conclusion from? I am not in any way suggesting that the potential 'places' are inherently different but rather that the way of story telling chosen by producers/directors/writers etc is.

And if anything, you're proving my point. Movies with central female characters still have guys talking to other guys about stuff, and develop sufficiently broad characters of both genders, which would be expected in any sufficiently long and sufficiently complex story.

When I say I agree with you that generally means I am probably going to be saying something that reinforces your argument. I would merely point out that the difference is in emphasis; that I perceive a significant portion of this to be resulting from a different method of story telling methodology a different emphasis on components such as almost entirely centered around a single (usually male) character as opposed to multiple subplots, rich settings and so forth - while you seem to simply chalk this up to sexism, I agree with this to an extent but note that the different types of story telling are simply vastly different in the perceived importance to portray non-central elements.

See the previous statements about women going to watch these movies despite the male dominance of most of them. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy; if a movie has a setting and a story that is otherwise appealing to a mixed audience but then doesn't even include one instance of two women talking to each other and has countless instances of men talking with each other, then it's not a surprise that men are going to watch it more.

Exactly. I agreed, which is why I said so - though noted I likely agreed to a lesser extent given this very point - women who go to such movies have money producers want, money is king (or queen if you prefer) and the emergence of films like hunger games prove this.

 

[Penumbra]

I like how in the article the author lists bullet points of what kinds of female character traits she'd like to see more of in media, and one of them is:

"That are crazy, like everyone (male or female) from Neon Genesis Evangelion." :biglaugh:

Yeah that's one of the funny ones, but it's true. That show was sufficiently gender-balanced.

The main character was male but there were plenty of female characters that were developed. One of the main characters was a particularly aggressive and strong female that had a flawed perfectionist, overly-aggressive, and overly-independent personality, for example.

Also from the article are the following examples:
-The Bride from Kill Bill
-I Love Lucy
-Tilda Swinton as the corporate villain of Michael Clayton
-Elliot from scrubs
-Elaine from Seinfeld
-Dory from Finding Nemo
-Belle from Beauty and the Beast
-Hermione from Harry Potter

What those characters have in common is that they're female characters rather than caricatures. Something flaw or funny or interesting can be said about all of them, but they also play major roles.

 

[Penumbra]

PERHAPS the former, though I think I have at least explained my reasoning, but where on earth do you draw the second conclusion from? I am not in any way suggesting that the potential 'places' are inherently different but rather that the way of story telling chosen by producers/directors/writers etc is.

Because you talked about different natures of movies leading to different casts, and have stressed that movies with female protagonists tend to have more interwoven subplots that give men a chance to interact with each other too.

Clearly just the centralized protagonist structure of the plot is not the driving factor, because if that was the case then we'd have tons of examples of popular movies where men don't talk to each other. If producers/directors/writers are choosing males more than females for more central roles, and using women more for interwoven sub-plot types of films, then that would just further support the point about a gender bias.

Some movies about war or prison or such are just inherently going to be gender biased. But the broad movies with popular audiences can just as easily have women in more central roles but tend not to.

When I say I agree with you that generally means I am probably going to be saying something that reinforces your argument. I would merely point out that the difference is in emphasis; that I perceive a significant portion of this to be resulting from a different method of story telling methodology a different emphasis on components such as almost entirely centered around a single character as opposed to multiple subplots, rich settings and so forth - while you seem to simply chalk this up to sexism, I agree with this to an extent but note that the different types of story telling are simply vastly different in the perceived importance to portray non-central elements.

And that 'method' is chosen by the writers/directors/producers, etc. It doesn't have to be.

Exactly. I agreed, which is why I said so - though noted I likely agreed to a lesser extent given this very point - women who go to such movies have money producers want, money is king (or queen if you prefer) and the emergence of films like hunger games prove this.

I agree. But guys love a lot of those movies too.

I watched Hunger Games because my boyfriend read the books and liked them a lot and wanted us to watch it, for example. It didn't target men or women, and it wasn't a girl book/movie; it was just a story that happened to feature a woman as the main character where it could have been a guy.

A significant chunk of the Avenger's billion dollar profit included women going to see it, which was mostly all dude characters. There were women everywhere in the theater when I saw it (less than 50% of course but still significant, like 30-40%). Same with Batman, and a ton of women are going to see the new Superman movie too, me included.

I think media is starting to catch on a bit, and the chart from that website that compiled these statistics does show an increasing trend of movies passing the test; it used to be well below 50% but now it is over 50% which is still bad but better. Disney movies are getting better at this too, with movies like Mulan, Princess and the Frog, and Tangled.

 

[Aquitaine]

Hey, you know Kill Bill volumes 1 and 2 totally pass the Bechdel Test.

The Bride talks with Vernita Green, Go Go Yubari, Sofie, O-Ren Ishii....all kinds of female protagonists and antagonists throughout both movies that aren't about a man.

I particularly loved the exchange between The Bride and the hired assassin in Volume 2 right after The Bride discovered she was pregnant, where both women had their guns aimed squarely at each other and were negotiating what to do next.

I also LOVED the dialogue right before and during the duel in the snow between O-Ren Ishii and The Bride. They talked about the sword, dying in such a beautiful environment, and how a caucasian girl likes to play with samurai swords. The entire fight scene, the cinematography, and the dialogue is incredible with female bad-*** characters who have depth, complexity, and a history of their own together as former assassins working in the same group.

It's another reason why I really love watching the Kill Bill movies repeatedly. I had a "girls night" at our house with a few friends of mine who identify as staunch feminists, and though they were hesitant to watch the movies for different reasons (violence or assumption that it was going to be like a Charlie's Angels kind of film), they all came out of it high-fiving each other and marveling at how great it was to see not only females as main characters in protagonist and antagonist roles, but that we saw female minor supporting characters that helped the plot along.

We had pecan pie with our post-film discussion, which was filled with sighs of relief that female-dominated action-movies exist with style and substance.

And the great thing is that women weren't the only fans of the movie. This film has had a very wide appeal in its audience. But you're right, Lyn, that quite a number of films targeted for mass appeal don't pass the Bechdel Test. I always remember telling husband that there were things about a bulk of Hollywood movies that just didn't sit right with me, and that I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Once I discovered the Bechdel Test, I shared it with my husband, and we have since on occasion talk about how it scores with Bechdel.

After having read your post I watched the pregnancy test scene on YT to see what happened. I haven't properly watched any of the Kill Bill films, since I'm not really keen on Action movie violence - but it was refreshing to watch a scene like that which didn't result in total death, and showed an element of humanity.

 

[Penumbra]

Hey, you know Kill Bill volumes 1 and 2 totally pass the Bechdel Test.

The Bride talks with Vernita Green, Go Go Yubari, Sofie, O-Ren Ishii....all kinds of female protagonists and antagonists throughout both movies that aren't about a man.

I particularly loved the exchange between The Bride and the hired assassin in Volume 2 right after The Bride discovered she was pregnant, where both women had their guns aimed squarely at each other and were negotiating what to do next.

I also LOVED the dialogue right before and during the duel in the snow between O-Ren Ishii and The Bride. They talked about the sword, dying in such a beautiful environment, and how a caucasian girl likes to play with samurai swords. The entire fight scene, the cinematography, and the dialogue is incredible with female bad-*** characters who have depth, complexity, and a history of their own together as former assassins working in the same group.

It's another reason why I really love watching the Kill Bill movies repeatedly. I had a "girls night" at our house with a few friends of mine who identify as staunch feminists, and though they were hesitant to watch the movies for different reasons (violence or assumption that it was going to be like a Charlie's Angels kind of film), they all came out of it high-fiving each other and marveling at how great it was to see not only females as main characters in protagonist and antagonist roles, but that we saw female minor supporting characters that helped the plot along.

We had pecan pie with our post-film discussion, which was filled with sighs of relief that female-dominated action-movies exist with style and substance.

And the great thing is that women weren't the only fans of the movie. This film has had a very wide appeal in its audience. But you're right, Lyn, that quite a number of films targeted for mass appeal don't pass the Bechdel Test. I always remember telling husband that there were things about a bulk of Hollywood movies that just didn't sit right with me, and that I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Once I discovered the Bechdel Test, I shared it with my husband, and we have since on occasion talk about how it scores with Bechdel.

I wasn't a big fan of Kill Bill, but for unrelated reasons. Just not my favorite.

That movie is definitely good example of a movie that has a female main character, plenty of female/female dialog, plenty of male and female characters, and appeals to both women and men (and probably more to men on average, even, but who knows). Great example, and one of the articles I linked to about genuinely strong female characters uses the Kill Bill Bride as an example too.

 

[Aquitaine]

Yeah that's one of the funny ones, but it's true. That show was sufficiently gender-balanced.

The main character was male but there were plenty of female characters that were developed. One of the main characters was a particularly aggressive and strong female that had a flawed perfectionist, overly-aggressive, and overly-independent personality, for example.

Also from the article are the following examples:
-The Bride from Kill Bill
-I Love Lucy
-Tilda Swinton as the corporate villain of Michael Clayton
-Elliot from scrubs
-Elaine from Seinfeld
-Dory from Finding Nemo
-Belle from Beauty and the Beast
-Hermione from Harry Potter

What those characters have in common is that they're female characters rather than caricatures. Something flaw or funny or interesting can be said about all of them, but they also play major roles.

Aye, NGE was pretty awesome. Confusing, fragmented, but awesome nonetheless. I liked Misato a lot, the way she tried to be a "Mother" to the three kids. Also there were plenty of times where Misato (a female character) would be guiding and "pushing" Shinji (the male character) to find his way and progress as a character. In that sense I guess you could say her presence was a strong one to the development of the story, she wasn't just some throwaway character, *and* she had her flaws.

I wonder now if media in Japan have the same problems as we do in the West, in regards to gender bias. Dunno about movies, but there certainly does seem to be some in Anime.

 

[Penumbra]

I'm not surprised to see the number of movies, particularly popular and successful movies that didn't pass the test. I always disliked something i perceived, which is that romantic comedies seem to be almost the only genre in which females are given a close shot of a balanced representation.

There are plenty of stories made out there that would work equally well whether the hero were a male or female, most stories would actually, but of course it's much more often made about a man rather than a woman. All it takes for this to change is for enough producers, script writers and directors (particularly the first two) to take that step more often.

I think there is a good amount of successful attempts, so i wonder why it isn't done more. It could be the number of male writers, directors and so forth Vs. the number of females, or it could be that there is a perception (true or false) that a movie is likely to make more money if the hero is a man. Not really sure.

I'm assuming it's a combination of more male creators, thousands of years of general patriarchy influencing worldwide culture (including the large movie hubs like Hollywood), and the tendency for a lot people to view men as the 'default' and women as the 'other'. Like if there's a role that could go to a man or a woman, then it just seems to naturally end up male unless the creator specifically chooses a woman.

In a movie if there's an action hero (even if it's in a context where peak physical strength isn't the main factor, like Luke Skywalker could have easily been Laura Skywalker without changing almost anything in the trilogy), a professor or scientist, a wise old sage (Obi Wan, Yoda, etc.), various corporate or political people, it seems to naturally end up as a man more often than a woman.

I think Star Wars is one of the funniest examples because as Lucas created character after character in an entire trilogy it was just guy after guy after guy. And you'd think that an editor or director or screenwriter somewhere along the line would haven been like, "George seriously there's like three women in this. Two of them are barely even in it. You could change almost any one of these characters in the series into a woman without changing anything at all."

 

[Debater Slayer]

Giving this more thought, it seems that failing the Bechdel Test so frequently isn't just an issue for movies; treating female characters as relatively insignificant and not having much depth to them occurs in other forms of media, too.

I'm not sure why there's so much gender bias in movies and other media, but I have a few possibilities in mind as to why (though I'm not sure any of them is the reason, as I said).

• Maybe it's because people got used to so many movies being dominated by male characters from when the perception of males being the "dominant" gender was prevalent and came to treat it as the standard, so writers, producers, and directors cater(ed) to this by focusing on male characters more than female ones.

• Most movies that become blockbusters don't pass the Bechdel Test but still succeed anyway, so the people who make those movies don't care about that aspect and don't see it as something that would have any negative effect on their works—especially considering that, as mentioned in another post, a significant portion of said movies' revenue comes from female audiences, so the people who make those movies wouldn't be risking a big loss of revenue if their movies failed the test.

• The writers, directors, and/or producers generally follow sexist traditions in their movie-making, so they tend to be biased and focus on developing male characters and ignoring female ones.

I don't think any of the above adequately explains why a movie couldn't have developed female characters who have depth, talk to each other about something other than male characters (at length, not just a short dialogue), and have important roles in the story and still become a blockbuster, though. I'm really not sure why so many movies take the direction of underrepresenting female characters and focusing on male ones.

 

[Penumbra]

Aye, NGE was pretty awesome. Confusing, fragmented, but awesome nonetheless. I liked Misato a lot, the way she tried to be a "Mother" to the three kids. Also there were plenty of times where Misato (a female character) would be guiding and "pushing" Shinji (the male character) to find his way and progress as a character. In that sense I guess you could say her presence was a strong one to the development of the story, she wasn't just some throwaway character, *and* she had her flaws.

I wonder now if media in Japan have the same problems as we do in the West, in regards to gender bias. Dunno about movies, but there certainly does seem to be some in Anime.

I had a lot of issues with NGE but from a gender perspective I had no complaints.

Anime does have kind of a bad reputation of using women for sex appeal. Fortunately there are some developed female characters.

If I think of my favorite Anime:

-Cowboy Bebop was mostly dudes, but I think they did okay with the gender balance because Faye was a sufficiently strong, flawed, and developed character, and Ed as an androgenyous female hacker was pretty unique.

-Samurai Champloo again was mostly dudes, which would be expected with a lot of sword action. But the main character was female, and even though she got captured and tied up and needed to be saved like 5 times in a 26 episode show, she was a good character that didn't rely on strength or swords. And there were two female sword fighters, with one of them being the first or second best fighter in the whole series.

-Full Metal Alchemist was created by a woman, although the characters are mostly dudes. The main hero, the main villain, the hero's brother, the hero's father, most of the military people, etc. But his love interest, his alchemy teacher, some of the villains and a few of the military personnel were strong female characters, especially one of the generals.

-FLCL had a good gender mix.

-Code Geass had some strong female characters, since they mainly fight with mechs.

I'd bet that a significant chunk of the episodes of these shows would all fail the Bechdel test though. Even with strong female characters, there's a lot of male/male interaction, a lot of male/female interaction, but there's often a lack of female/female interaction.

 

[dust1n]

Bechdel Test Movie List

 

[InformedIgnorance]

In the centrally focused style I was talking about (using the more extreme example by which to compare - note that most films do not strictly adhere but rather incorporate some element of this style to different extents), most dialogue involves the protagonist either as one of the parties or as the subject. In such a case discussion between other characters regardless of their gender is more likely to be focused about the protagonist or the antagonist, the conditions that trigger actions by either (pro or ant) and the repercussions of their actions - in any of these cases, discussion about the protagonist is at least indirectly quite probable. For a film that more strongly adheres to this type and has a male protagonist, most conversations would either include a male or be about a male.

I agree about the casting decisions and role of the particular characters differentiated based on gender; and personally I do believe that this is sexist - I also believe that this sexism is the result of a perception of target audience preferences for particular film types and that this is likely to be different depending on the type of film to be produced and thus it's target audience and thus it's potential casting decisions and determination of roles.

To grossly oversimplify the perception - men relate better to male leads; are simple and thus like simple movies; therefore most films aimed at men will have a male lead, will have a relatively simple style and therefore communication will be either between the male lead and someone else, or actually about the male lead. I agree it is sexism, but it is a sexism based on perceived audience behavior.

 

[freethinker44]

This is a graph from bechdeltest.com. It actually shows that 53% of the movies in their databases pass the test.

 

[Penumbra]

Giving this more thought, it seems that failing the Bechdel Test so frequently isn't just an issue for movies; treating female characters as relatively insignificant and not having much depth to them occurs in other forms of media, too.

I'm not sure why there's so much gender bias in movies and other media, but I have a few possibilities in mind as to why (though I'm not sure any of them is the reason, as I said).

• Maybe it's because people got used to so many movies being dominated by male characters from when the perception of males being the "dominant" gender was prevalent and came to treat it as the standard, so writers, producers, and directors cater(ed) to this by focusing on male characters more than female ones.

• Most movies that become blockbusters don't pass the Bechdel Test but still succeed anyway, so the people who make those movies don't care about that aspect and don't see it as something that would have any negative effect on their works—especially considering that, as mentioned in another post, a significant portion of said movies' revenue comes from female audiences, so the people who make those movies wouldn't be risking a big loss of revenue if their movies failed the test.

• The writers, directors, and/or producers generally follow sexist traditions in their movie-making, so they tend to be biased and focus on developing male characters and ignoring female ones.

I don't think any of the above adequately explains why a movie couldn't have developed female characters who have depth, talk to each other about something other than male characters (at length, not just a short dialogue), and have important roles in the story and still become a blockbuster, though. I'm really not sure why so many movies take the direction of underrepresenting female characters and focusing on male ones.

Yup, the Bechdel test applies to all types of fiction.

If I recall it was originally stated about movies, but it applies to everything. I specifically focused on movies here because they tend to be the medium I'm most familiar with (I'm not a huge reader of written fiction or a huge video game player or a frequent watcher of television shows).

I do notice it a lot in games too, though.

Mario and Sonic are dudes.

The Zelda games are named after Princess Zelda but Link is almost always the main protagonist that the character plays as. Zelda is at least depicted as a consistently important and strong character. (I'd love a full budget Zelda game where I get to play as Zelda throughout the whole game for once. Playing as Link with the same general abilities every time is cool and all but they could really mix it up with an adventure with Zelda. She's got magic and a bow and arrows.)

Often there's a focus on sex appeal with characters like Laura Croft but that's a start I guess.

It seems there was a bit of a fad where there were games where women save men, but these are generally not the sweeping full budget primary and highly-marketed games.

I played Starcraft 2 Heart of the Swarm recently which had a female protagonist and passed the Bechdel test. That was nice.

Most Final Fantasy lead characters are men. My avatar is the main character from Final Fantasy 13, a woman. Final Fantasy 6 had a female lead too, and also Final Fantasy 10-2. The others were all male leads I think.