These days I prefer to evaluate movies by what I call “the Bechdel ratio”. First, don’t make the test pass/fail. Count the number of minutes that the movie is actually showing two women with names talking about something other than men. Then, measure the movie with the reverse Bechdel test. How many minutes does the movie show of two men with names talking to each other about something other than women? (That’s usually about 80% of most movies, not counting the times when nobody is talking because there are explosions, monsters chasing people, sunsets etc. You also can’t count times when a man is talking to a woman. Hard to decide how to count a conversation with multiple men and women.).

Finally, compare the two ratios, and then you get a good sense of how women are represented in that movie. I actually have seen a couple of movies that failed the reverse Bechdel test, and there are now more movies which have a higher Bechdel ratio for women. Those Movies are usually worth watching, even if they are not that good, because they have to go into new territory, and therefore usually come up with something interesting.