The rationale behind the Bechdel Test and the Mako Mori test is to regulate the movies that are coming out. They are checking that movies aren’t misrepresenting certain groups in films. When movies don't meet pass test like the Mako Mori test and the Bechdel Test that shows there might not be that much diversity in films. Even if a film does not meet the Bechdel or the Mako Mori test that doesn't mean that the movie is not good. The Bechdel test is a checklist for movies the requirements are: it has to have at least two women in it. The women have to talk to each other. And lastly when they talk to each other it has to be about something other than a man.

The disney movie Frozen meets the Bechdel test. The movie Frozen is about two sisters who after losing their parents have step up to the responsibilities of running a kingdom. The older sister Elsa has had special powers all her life which makes her distance herself from her younger sister Ana. Ana doesn’t fully understand why her sister is so distant and all she really wants is to have a sister relationship with Elsa that they had when they were younger. In the movie Ana and Elsa are the main characters which meets rules number one of the Bechdel test. The sisters talk to each other in the movie about how different things are going to now that they are in control of the kingdom that’s meets the requirement of talking to each other and having a conversation about something other than a man.

My test is called the Pretty Woman test. The three requirements are that there is a woman who has a job that is not socially acceptable but still gets respected. Secondly, the man must be able to have conversations other than work. Lastly the woman has to have a friend that helps her stay connected to reality. The movie Pretty Woman with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere meets this test. In the movie Julia plays a hooker who falls in love with the success businessman, Richard Gere after leaving a business party in Los Angeles.  The first requirement of the Pretty Woman test is that there is a woman has a job that is not socially acceptable. Julia Roberts plays a hooker, in society people who are prostitutes/hookers are disrespected and look down on. After they both take a liking in each other Richard Gere offers to give her better life. This conversation meets the second rule that talks about something other than work. Julia has a friend who she works with that visits her while she stays with Richard. Her friend reminds her of her life before she met Richard and how things will be after he leaves. The third requirement is that there is a friend that connects her to her real life.

This movie Dangal is about a Phogat family, telling the story of Mahavir Singh Phogat, an amateur wrestler. who trained his daughters Geeta and Babita to become India's first world-class female wrestlers.Mahavir Singh Phogat is a former wrestler and national champion in the in Haryana. He was forced by his father to give up the sport. Mahavir was very disappointed that he could not win a medal for his country, he vows that his unborn son will. Disappointed upon having four daughters, he gives up hope. One day when his older daughters Geeta and Babita come home after beating up two boys because they said hurtful comments, he starts to realize their potential to become wrestlers and begins coaching them. People always made fun of Geeta and her sister Babita. They would say stuff like, “you are a girl. Girls don’t do stuff like this.” The sisters started to lose friends.

Mahavir’s methods for his daughters are harsh. They have to do early morning workouts and cut their hair short to avoid lice. Despite facing negativity from the villagers, he still goes on with them and trains them in his makeshift mud pit. Geeta and Babita start to resent their father for his treatment but they soon start to realize that he wants them to have a good future and not grow up to be stereotypical housewives. Motivated, they willingly participate in his coaching. Mahavir takes his daughters to wrestling tournaments where they wrestle with boys and defeat them. He is unable to afford for wrestling mats so he uses two layers of mattresses and trains them.

Geeta goes on to win the junior and senior championships at the State. Then she heads to the National Sports Academy in Patiala to train for the forthcoming Commonwealth Games. Geeta makes friends and begins to disregard the rules and discipline she has been brought up with by her father. She starts to regularly watch television, eats street food, and grows her hair out. Her coach's training methods and wrestling techniques are very different from her father's. Geeta thinks they are better than her father’s techniques. When she went home, Geeta told her father that his old techniques are not good, she defeats her aging. Babita tells Geeta that she shouldn't forget their father's techniques and reminds her that she owes all the success and happiness to him. Babita follows Geeta to the academy. Geeta, however, is losing every match at the international level.  Geeta is persuaded by Babita, and she tearfully makes a better relationship with her father.

Using Mahavir’s techniques Geeta wins the Championship competition. She becomes the first Indian Women wrestler to win gold medals at the Games.

This movie Dangal does pass the Bechdel test. In the movie there are two girls Geeta and Babita. They try to be better than guys, They don’t have a certain type of interaction with guys. Dangal also passes The Mako Mori test. Like I said before this is a story about two girls becoming successful. It doesn’t support another man's story.  

This movie ghostbusters is about paranormal activities that happens in Manhattan. A group of women stop and saves the city from getting destroyed. Ghostbusters does pass my own test. My test is called “Superior.” My test is about women’s strength. And how women can be stronger and more superior than men. In this four girls saved a city from destruction. My test is kind of self explanatory. If a movie is about women achieving goals that men can achieve then it passes the test. Ghostbusters passes it.

Using the Bechdel Test and Mako Mori Tests we can determine the amount of representation of women in films. The Bechdel Test uses three simple requirements, 1) are there two women in it that have names? 2) do they talk to each other, and 3) do they talk about something other than a man? The Mako Mori test goes in a little deeper asking a) is there at least one female character; b) who gets her own narrative arc; c) that is not about supporting a man’s story? You look at these two tests and think that they’re simple enough, any movie would pass. But that is not the case. These tests exist because there are people that believe women are everywhere in film, have great stories being told about them, and that women are represented. These tests were created and exist to prove those people wrong, to show them that there is a problem with how women are represented in films.

One movie that I realized does not pass the Bechdel or Mako Mori tests is Now You See Me 2. Now You See Me 2 follows the story of four illusionists known as the Four Horsemen. After fleeing from a stage show, the Horsemen find themselves in more trouble in Macau, China. A deceitful tech genius Walter Mabry forces the skilled magicians to steal a powerful chip that can control all of the world's computers. Meanwhile, the vengeful FBI agent Dylan Rhodes hatches his own plot against Thaddeus Bradley, the man he blames for the death of his father. This movie does meet the Bechdel or Mako Mori tests because out of all of the main characters, only one is a woman. In this movie there are three women that have roles with lines, but none of them ever have a conversation with one another. Therefore it only meets ⅓ of the requirements for the Bechdel test. As for the Mako Mori test, there is at least one female character, but none of them have their own narrative arc that doesn’t support a mans story. This movie only has ⅓ of the requirements for the Mako Mori test. As a result, this movie passes neither tests.

As for my test that I have created, the following are the requirements:

1. There is at least one woman-

2. That is not white-

3. That is not straight-

4. That talks to another woman-

5. About something other than a man.

This movie follows three women that come from very different situations and lives. After breaking up with her girlfriend, a nightclub singer, Jane, answers a personal ad from Robin, a real estate agent with AIDS, seeking a cross-country travel partner. On their way from New York City to Los Angeles, the two stop by Pittsburgh to pick up Jane’s friend Holly, who is trying to escape an abusive relationship. With three wildly distinct personalities, the women must overcome their differences to help one another in times of need. This movie passes my test because it has more than one woman, a woman of color, a woman that is not straight, and they all talk to each other about something other than a man. They talk about their lives and the struggles they face within their lives. I believe it is important for any film to meet this criteria because there is way too little representation in movies with women of color, women that are gay, and just women that have stories about them.

Ryan King

Intersectional Feminism

Film Review

Over time films have shown a common theme of having women assume either love interest roles or subservient roles to men.Having seen so many different films showcasing woman as only being necessary for these kinds of positions people like Alison Bechdel and the fictional Mako Mori have created test to analyze how often that women are actually represented in more diverse roles other than being a tool used by men to achieve a stereotypical goal.These test exist to give directors an idea of what modern consumers want to see, strong independent women who are not constantly fixating over the attention of a man.

Frozen is a popular Disney movie about the relationship between two sisters and and their roads to self acceptance.Many people are very excited about the film because this is the first time in disney history where we see two strong and self sufficient women who do not rely on men to accomplish goals and have their own interesting character arcs.Every other time we are introduced to females with these credentials they are usually portrayed to either be a villain or antagonist character, but Frozen changes that stereotype.Frozen is one of my favorite movies because director Jennifer Lee made sure that the film did more than just pass the Bechdel test.She made sure that everyone watching the movie would be able to see a piece of themselves in one of the main characters.Lee accomplishes this goal by changing the entire narrative of princesses being saved by their Prince Charming,Instead she chooses to have Elsa save Anna with a true act of love rather than just true loves kiss.

3) Create your own anti-gender bias film test, describe the criteria for your test and explain why you believe it is important for a film to meet this criteria. Analyze a different movie that meets the criteria for your test.

The film must have the following to pass the King Test

• Two named people of color

• Who don't feed into stereotypical behavior

For the movie “the Place beyond the Pines” I would say that this movie does pass both the King test and the Bechdel test.This movie is about a thief who steals to support his small family and his partners antics to stay above the law.The movie takes a sudden shift when half way through Ryan Gosling is killed and his estranged girlfriend and son live their lives.the movie gets really interesting when Ryan's son and the cop who accidentally killed him while on the job wind up in the same highschool and start to piece together stories their families have shared with them before realizing that his bestfriends dad killed his dad. I feel like this movie has passed my test because the director takes really interesting measures to make the cast very diverse.Instead of having minorities be the theives in the movie they become more of protagonist aids and still remain very critical to the movie.

A modern day feminist film review

In this socially developing day and age, we find more reasons to dissect the beliefs , cultures and practices that surround us in everyday life, especially in technology. People are more aware than ever of the subliminal messages used in advertising, movies, songs, etc. that embed themselves in our subconscious and shape our perspective and how we interpret situations. A product of these detections is the Mako Mori and Bechdel Tests, where we are forced to look in from, for some, a relatively unfamiliar perspective. Both of these inventions are the result of something, that something being most closely related to the misogyny and toxic masculinity constantly portrayed in the media. More often than not, in American media a woman’s most frequent roles include being obedient, submissive, and important only if they are talking about a man. The Mako Mori method tests the inclusivity of well developed female characters that don’t contribute to a man’s story. The bechdel test follows a similar dynamic, asking whether a work of fiction has at least two women can share dialogue that doesn’t involve the topic of men.

If the question is why these tests must exist, you’ll find that it’s much easier to recover a time you watched a movie that involved men, whose main purpose wasn’t to get a woman’s attention or please them, but in fact the women just happen to be a factor in their story. Take the movie 50/50, for instance. Adam, a middle aged man who prided himself in his health has his life turned around when malignant tumors are found in his spine, docking his mortality rate by 50%. Along with his family, he tries to keep good spirits, even though everyone around him is prepared for the worst. He falls for his therapist, one of the three women represented in the entire movie. Aside from talking about Adam’s doctor, who is notably also male, his therapist and mother don’t discuss anything that isn’t regarding the main character or the supporting male roles. Enough information is given to conclude that this movie doesn’t pass either the mako mori or bechdel test, and it can’t be blamed on the plot of the movie, the year it came out, the actors, etc. It’s a combination of the choices made by the director, audience, and culture of hollywood movies in general.

The reclamation test

Based on how women are represented and depicted in a majority of these movies, I have decided to test how relevant a female character becomes or how her character diminishes when a male character is eliminated, regardless of if they’re main characters or not. It’s important that this criteria is met, because it shows the audience that a woman’s role doesn’t always have to be temporary or niche. There’s often little diversity in the role of a woman, she only displays a limited number of emotions and concerns, which frequently reflects the actions in the role of a man. To show that a female character can develop freely, without any other permission than the progression of the plot itself, sends a more positive and encouraging message to viewers furthermore changing the way in which they’re influenced by movies.

Lady bloodfight

This movie is about an American woman, Jane, who travels to Hong Kong to fulfill her destiny of becoming a champion in the fight of the “Kumite”, an underground, full-contact martial arts competition for women. The movie focuses on another integral relationship regarding her trainer Shu, who is also a woman. Shu and her rival Wai both compete for the throne by training students like Jane to battle on their behalf.The judges of the competition worry themselves only with the monetary reward the popularity will bring, and therefore allow the fights to be limitless, brutal, and often fatal. Nearing the end of the story, we come to find that Shu and Wei were at each other’s necks for so long because Wei blamed Shu for the death of her brother, which was ruled as a suicide that nobody could wrap their heads around. Jane further investigates, and finds that one of the corrupt judges not only had to do with Wei’s brother’s death, but also the death of her own father, who traveled to Hong Kong many years before to battle in the same competition. Jane brings the man to public confession at the end of the final battle, ending the long-time contention between Shu and Wei and bringing honor to her father. Despite the main character’s motives being in the likeness of men, this information wasn’t relevant until the end of the movie. Up until then, the women trained and fought because they felt it was in their hearts to do so, to teach and learn internal peace and contentedness. Jane’s father, Wei’s brother, and the evil judge had relevance throughout the movie, sure, but they weren’t permanent or centerpieces for less than half of it. The only character that was physically seen was the evil judge, and even then his presence was quickly dismissed. The movie passes the reclamation test with flying colors because of this, because each female character was strong enough on their own, and for a change the male characters were only relevant because of the female’s role.

The Bechdel Test and Mako Mori Test are movie measures to help rate the movie. These exist to help reviewers analyze and understand movies better whenever they watch it.

The Bechdel Test follows in these three categories;

• “It has to have at least two [named] women in it”

• “Who talk to each other”

• “About something besides a man”

The Mako Mori Test follows in these three categories;

• “at least one female character”

• “who gets her own narrative arc”

• “that is not about supporting a man's story”

Kay’s anti-gender movie test follows in these three categories;

• A woman must have a meaningful role within the movie

• Everybody especially men act supportive for the women

• The women shouldn’t have to show her body to still get the audience attention (sex scenes)

Twilight Review:

Overall, Twilight is a movie about a girl named Bella who was high school sophomore moving with her dad to Forks, Washington. However along this move she fell in love with Edward who she later found out that he is a vampire. This movie would obviously have a lot of conflict between her being a human and her boyfriend being a vampire but it did not stop them from loving each other. Throughout the movie, she tries to find herself after she decided to live with her father.

The Bechdel Test:

• It has two women in it who are (Bella and Alice)

• The women talks to each other about vampires

• But it’s always about a man which is Edward (Bella’s Boyfriend)

Rate ⅔

The Mako Mori Test:

• It has a least one woman in it who is (Bella)

• This female character has her narrative arc as to why she moves to Forks with her father from Arizona. Then the movie reaches its climax and resolution after she met Edward.

• The entire movie supports a man which is her boyfriend for being a vampire.

Rate ⅔

My anti-gender movie Test:

• Bella role in this romantic movie is the new girl everyone pays attention to in school since her dad is a cop and she dates Edward whos semi-popular at this High School

• Edward doesn’t seem to support a lot of what she wants because he’s always so in control and dominant towards her. Which turns her on.

• There was a time she was going to have sex with Edward but he wanted to have self control

Rate 1 ½

Fifty Shades of Grey Review:

Fifty Shades of Grey is a movie about a woman graduating from college named Ana Steele who fell in love with a successful business man named Christian Grey. Grey was a dominant sex addict who need proper love and after meeting Ana that is what he found. Ana allowed him to open up about a lot of issues that he was facing in life. However, no matter how much Ana changed his outlook of love he was still in control of her.

The Bechdel Test:

• It has to have at least two women in the movie whose names are; anastasia steele who’s the character Christian Grey “girlfriend” and her Ana’s roommate Kate Kavanaugh who’s a reporter for the school’s newspaper

• Who have an extreme sexual relationship with each other

• Mostly everything was all about him throughout the movie

Rate ⅔

The Mako Mori Test:

• The one female main character which is Ana.

• She doesn’t gets her own narrative arc because in the movie we as the reviewers what it was like growing up like her boyfriend.

• This is about supporting a man's story by his success and background of his life.

Rate ⅓

My anti-gender movie Test:

• Ana doesn’t have too much of a meaningful role other than being Christian’s girlfriend.

• Christian supported her as she was graduating in college.

• The majority of the movie included Ana and Christian sex scenes which caught the audience attention.

Rate ⅓

Hidden Figures Review:

This movie is about African-American women who worked for NASA in the 1960’s. During that period, it was very hard for women to find a job that is mostly qualified for men. In addition, these women were African-American so of course it was harder for them to get the exact job that they deserve working with NASA. An African-American woman named Katherine Johnson was the smartest mathematician within the entire company. However, with her abilities to solve equations she helped NASA stop their racist views towards the African-American community. This entire movie allowed the Caucasians (especially men) have more respect towards African-American people because of her hard work.

The Bechdel Test:

• It has two women in it who are Katherine Johnson and Mary Jackson

• The women talks to each other about mathematical calculations

• The majority of the the movie was about space

Rate 3/3

The Mako Mori Test:

• It has a least one woman in it who is Katherine

• This female character has her narrative arc as to how she help figure out the proper calculations to orbit a spaceship around Earth. As a result, it was a success.

• The entire movie supports an the first African-American women working for NASA resolving a critical issue in space for the country.

Rate 3/3

My anti-gender movie Test:

• Katherine was one of the many African-American women to play a role as a brave woman working with a lot of men trying to get the first man to reach the moon.

• Once, she proved how accurate  her calculations was to the person in charge of NASA everyone respected and supported her work.

• There wasn’t a sex scene going on throughout the entire movie to get more audience to watch this. Instead this movie was a good movie by actually demonstrating history that was never told about African-American women in the 1960’s working for NASA.

Rate 3/3

Conclusion:

Twilight and Fifty Shade of Grey is a romantic movie that include the women’s lovers to be in control of everything that they do. However, Hidden Figures is about an African-American woman changing the mindset of Caucasian men and women underestimating intelligent smart african-American women like herself. While Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey get their high rating from the sex scenes and romantic drama Hidden Figures got the high rating from seeing a woman making history with science. How come we can not have people play roles like this in any genre of movie to get the best rating? With or without sex scenes, sexism, and homophobic insults throughout the movie?

Sites:

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Mako_Mori_test

https://bechdeltest.com/

Films go through different types of test to see what content is included in the film. The two test that I will be analyzing is the Bechdel test and Mako Mori test. The Bechdel Test is a test that portrays women in a way that is sexist or characterized by gender stereotyping. The Mako Mori test is a media test that analyzes a film to see If they have at least one female character that gets her own Narrative and does not support a man’s story. The two films that I will be analyzing are Frozen and The Hunger games.

The First Film that I will be analyzing is “The Hunger Games.” The Hunger Games is a film that released on March 23, 2012. This Movie follows a female main character named Katniss Everdeen. This movie takes place in the capital of Panem. The movie is about a survival game that has 12 districts and two teenagers are selected from each district. All the citizens have to watch as the teens fight until only one remains. Katniss has little to rely on other than her hunting skills and sharp instincts in an arena where she must weigh survival against love. This movie fails the Bechdel test because it doesn’t really portray women in a sexual way. It does pass the Mako Mori test because It has a female main character that doesn’t support a man’s story.

The next film that I will be talking about is Frozen. Frozen is an animated film that was created in 2013. The story follows two sisters named Anna and Elsa. Anna must find her sister Elsa because she stormed out of a party. While Anna was searching for her sister, she comes across a Snowman named Olaf and a man named Kristoff. They decide to work together to try and find Elsa. This Movie Fails the Bechdel test because it doesn’t portray women in a sexual way. But it does pass the Mako Mori test because It has a female main character that doesn’t support a man’s story.

The name of my test is called the Love denial test. In order to pass this test, there has to be a female that’s the main protagonist and that female must not fall in love with a male. The hunger games and Frozen both fail this test. The Hunger games fails this test because Katniss is the Female main protagonist in her film, but she falls in love with a guy named Peeta. Frozen passes the test because Anna is the Female main protagonist in her film, but she falls in love with a guy named Kristoff.