All movies should pass the Bechdel Test unless there's a specific reason for them not to. For instance, if a movie is about an all-male culture -- a movie set in a monastery, among the gay male subculture of the Seventies, about a prison -- then there is a reason for the movie not to pass.
However, absent a SPECIFIC reason for them NOT to pass, they SHOULD.
If the movie doesn't pass, it's a sign of a structural failing in the movie. It's a sign that it was written wrong. You look at it, and you notice that it doesn't pass, and you rewrite.
The Bechdel test is a first-pass approximation of the question, "Do women in this story have individual agency?" If they don't, then the story had better be one ABOUT women not having individual agency, such as one in which they are absent because of an all-male culture. Otherwise, you've screwed up.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2012-05-08 01:35 am (UTC)All movies should pass the Bechdel Test unless there's a specific reason for them not to. For instance, if a movie is about an all-male culture -- a movie set in a monastery, among the gay male subculture of the Seventies, about a prison -- then there is a reason for the movie not to pass.
However, absent a SPECIFIC reason for them NOT to pass, they SHOULD.
If the movie doesn't pass, it's a sign of a structural failing in the movie. It's a sign that it was written wrong. You look at it, and you notice that it doesn't pass, and you rewrite.
The Bechdel test is a first-pass approximation of the question, "Do women in this story have individual agency?" If they don't, then the story had better be one ABOUT women not having individual agency, such as one in which they are absent because of an all-male culture. Otherwise, you've screwed up.