Passes the Bechdel test
Arcade
1993. Directed by Albert Pyun, written by Charles Band (story) and David S. Goyer (screenplay).
The Bechdel test
Bechdel score
3 / 3
Passes
-
Yes
1. At least two women
4 women characters. 5 of them speak. -
Yes
2. Who talk to each other
In 2 scenes out of 70. -
Yes
3. About something besides a man
In those scenes, our script parser found no man named. See the scene.
Second opinion
Not rated bechdeltest.com readers haven't rated this film.
The film
Alex Manning is a troubled suburban teenager. Her mother committed suicide and the school counselor feels that she has not dealt with her feelings properly. Manning and her friends decide to visit the local video arcade known as "Dante's Inferno" where a new virtual reality arcade game called "Arcade" is being test marketed by a computer company CEO who is more than willing to hand out free samples of the home console version and hype up the game as if his job is depending on it, and it is. However, it soon becomes clear that the teenagers who play the game and lose are being imprisoned inside the virtual reality world by the central villain "Arcade". And it gets worse when a virtual reality game begins to take over the minds of teenagers. The computer company felt it would be a good idea to use a boy's brain cells in order to make the game's villain more realistic. Instead, it made the game deadly. And so now Nick and Alex must enlist the help of the game's programmer and head to the video arcade for a final showdown with "Arcade" and his deadly virtual world.
- Released
- 30 Mar 1994
- Genres
- Sci-Fi
- Rated
- R
- IMDb
- 4.7 / 10
- Elsewhere
- View on IMDb
Starring, by lines spoken
- Women
- Men
- Not in the cast list
- Bigger name, more lines
- Alex 200 lines, woman
- Nick 154 lines, man
- Difford 28 lines, man
- Greg 25 lines, man
- Stilts 22 lines, man
- Albert 21 lines, man
- Arcade 18 lines, man
- Laurie 16 lines, woman
- Benz 12 lines
- Boy 8 lines, man
Full cast, 18 people
- Megan Ward as Alex Manning
- Peter Billingsley as Nick
- John de Lancie as Difford
- Seth Green as Stilts
- Sharon Farrell as Alex's Mom
- A. J. Langer as Laurie
- Bryan Dattilo as Greg
- Brandon Rane as Benz
- B.J. Barie as DeLoache
- Humberto Ortiz as Boy
- Norbert Weisser as Albert
- Don Stark as Finster
- Dorothy Dells as Mrs. Weaver
- Todd Starks as Burt Manning
- Alexandria Byrne as Kid at arcade parlour
- David Sederholm as Receptionist
- Tom Stoviak as Waches
- Jonathan Fuller as Arcade
Who talks, scene by scene
Lines of dialogue in every 2 scenes, start to finish. Women above the line, men below. 6% of lines come from characters we couldn't match to the cast list and aren't shown.
Women
Men
Scene 1 Scene 70
Hover, tap or tab to a bar to see those scenes: where they happen and who's talking.
Show the numbers
| Scenes | Women's lines | Men's lines |
|---|---|---|
| 1 to 2 | 0 | 0 |
| 3 to 4 | 3 | 1 |
| 5 to 6 | 4 | 3 |
| 7 to 8 | 8 | 25 |
| 9 to 10 | 4 | 35 |
| 11 to 12 | 8 | 12 |
| 13 to 14 | 4 | 0 |
| 15 to 16 | 3 | 2 |
| 17 to 18 | 9 | 7 |
| 19 to 20 | 1 | 1 |
| 21 to 22 | 27 | 32 |
| 23 to 24 | 7 | 3 |
| 25 to 26 | 14 | 17 |
| 27 to 28 | 0 | 1 |
| 29 to 30 | 1 | 3 |
| 31 to 32 | 10 | 11 |
| 33 to 34 | 8 | 20 |
| 35 to 36 | 9 | 36 |
| 37 to 38 | 0 | 3 |
| 39 to 40 | 0 | 0 |
| 41 to 42 | 0 | 0 |
| 43 to 44 | 4 | 4 |
| 45 to 46 | 2 | 1 |
| 47 to 48 | 23 | 33 |
| 49 to 50 | 11 | 10 |
| 51 to 52 | 10 | 6 |
| 53 to 54 | 0 | 0 |
| 55 to 56 | 0 | 2 |
| 57 to 58 | 17 | 3 |
| 59 to 60 | 11 | 6 |
| 61 to 62 | 2 | 4 |
| 63 to 64 | 5 | 5 |
| 65 to 66 | 14 | 1 |
| 67 to 68 | 2 | 3 |
| 69 to 70 | 4 | 7 |
The evidence
- Straight from the script
- Counted from the script and the credits
Tap an exhibit to open it.
Exhibit A: the passing scenes
The scene our parser counted as passing, word for word.
ALEX: Laurie...wake up... LAURIE: I am awake. Don't you see them?
LAURIE: Angels. There are angels inside. ALEX: We have to turn it off, Laurie. I'm turning it off...
ALEX: Fuck you. ALEX REFLECTION: ANY TIME, BITCH.
Exhibit B: every 100 lines
Out of every 100 lines with a known speaker, 43 are women's.
225 lines from women, 297 from men.
- Women
- Men
Exhibit C: who's in it
4 women and 11 men in the cast. 5 women and 12 men from it get lines.
Characters
With lines
- Women
- Men
Exhibit D: who gets heard
The first woman speaks at line 2 of 553.
The longest stretch with no woman speaking runs 24 lines.
Every line of dialogue, first to last
- First line by a woman
- Longest stretch with no woman speaking
Words spoken
Women speak 33% of the words (1,508), men 67% (3,057). Women have 43% of the lines, so their lines run shorter than men's.
Exhibit E: the test the other way
Two named men talk to each other about something besides a woman. It passes the reverse test.
Conversations between two named characters
Two women
5
Two men
32
Exhibit F: behind the camera
2 of the 10 people in these jobs are women.
Across the whole crew, 39% of the people whose gender is listed are women.
- Directed by
- Albert Pyun (man)
- Written by
- David S. Goyer (man)
- Story by
- Charles Band (man)
- Produced by
- Cathy Gesualdo (woman)
- Shot by
- George Mooradian (man)
- Edited by
- Miles Wynton (gender not listed)
- Production design by
- Don Day (gender not listed)
- Costumes by
- Cindy Rosenthal (gender not listed)
- Cast by
- Tom McSweeney (man), Cathy Henderson (woman)
The crew, department by department
-
Production
6 women, 4 men, 4 not listed
-
Sound
0 women, 3 men, 5 not listed
-
Art
2 women, 1 men, 3 not listed
-
Costume & Make-Up
1 women, 1 men, 3 not listed
-
Other crew
0 women, 4 men, 1 not listed
-
Directing
1 women, 1 men, 1 not listed
-
Camera
1 women, 1 men
-
Writing
0 women, 2 men
- Women
- Men
- Gender not listed on TMDB
Exhibit G: how old the stars were
Women: 31 on average. Men: 24 on average.
The top-billed cast, at the film's release.
Women
A. J. Langer 19, Megan Ward 23, Sharon Farrell 52
Men
Humberto Ortiz 13, Seth Green 19, Bryan Dattilo 21, Peter Billingsley 22, John de Lancie 45
About this analysis
Our parser read the script: 70 scenes and 553 lines of dialogue. How the test works
