Passes the Bechdel test
Tower of Terror
1997. Directed by D.J. MacHale, written by D.J. MacHale.
The Bechdel test
Bechdel score
3 / 3
Passes
-
Yes
1. At least two women
8 women characters. 8 of them speak. -
Yes
2. Who talk to each other
In 15 scenes out of 178. -
Yes
3. About something besides a man
In those scenes, our script parser found no man named. See the scene.
Second opinion
Agree bechdeltest.com readers give it 3 out of 3.
The film
In 1939, in Los Angeles, four guests of a party and the elevator operator disappear on the eleventh floor of the Hollywood Tower Hotel in the Halloween night. Sixty years later, the journalist Buzzy Crocker writes sensationalist stories for the tabloid The National Inquisitor after being fired from the Los Angeles Banner for writing fake news. His former girlfriend Jill Perry is the Banner's editor, but Buzzy fell in disgrace and now produces fake news using his teenage niece Anna to help him. When the elderly Abigail Gregory visits Buzzy at home, she tells an amazing story to him about the mysterious disappearance of the five people: the actor Gilbert London, his girlfriend and singer Carolyn Crosson, a.k.a. Claire Poulet, the child star Sally Shine, her nanny Emeline Partridge and the operator Dewey Todd. Abigail says that Emeline was a witch that hated Sally and put a spell on the girl, trapping the ghosts in the hotel. She would need a book of spells and belongings of the five people in the elevator to revert the curse. Buzzy and Anna meet the present hotel owner and mechanic Chris 'Q' Todd, who is Dewey's grandson and is afraid of the haunted hotel. Soon Buzzy and Anna encounter the ghosts and together with the skeptical Jill, they learn the true story of the curse.
- Released
- 26 Oct 1997
- Genres
- Comedy, Family, Horror
- Rated
- TV-PG
- IMDb
- 6.2 / 10
- Awards
- 1 nomination total
- Elsewhere
- View on IMDb
Starring, by lines spoken
- Women
- Men
- Not in the cast list
- Bigger name, more lines
- Buzzy 192 lines, man
- Anna 86 lines, woman
- Jill 78 lines, woman
- Abigail 59 lines, woman
- Q 37 lines
- Dewey 28 lines, man
- Gilbert 28 lines, man
- Claire 26 lines, woman
- Sally 23 lines, woman
- Carolyn 17 lines
Full cast, 21 people
- Steve Guttenberg as Buzzy Crocker
- Kirsten Dunst as Anna Petterson
- Nia Peeples as Jill Perry
- Michael McShane as Chris 'Q' Todd
- Amzie Strickland as Abigail Gregory
- Melora Hardin as Claire Poulet
- Alastair Duncan as Gilbert
- Lindsay Ridgeway as Sally Shine
- Shira Roth as Young Abigail
- Lynne Donahoe as Chloe
- Lela Ivey as Patricia Peterson
- Wendy Worthington as Emeline Partridge
- John Franklin as Dewey Todd
- Richard Minchenberg as Dr. Daniels
- Marcus Smythe as Sergeon
- Don Perry as Great Grand Dad
- Michael Waltman as Reporter
- Ben Kronen as Mr. Galvao
- Bill Elliot as Bandleader
- Dean Marsico as Photographer
- Darrell Britt as Ghost
Who talks, scene by scene
Lines of dialogue in every 4 scenes, start to finish. Women above the line, men below. 12% of lines come from characters we couldn't match to the cast list and aren't shown.
Women
Men
Scene 1 Scene 178
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 4 | 0 | 0 |
| 5 to 8 | 0 | 0 |
| 9 to 12 | 0 | 0 |
| 13 to 16 | 0 | 0 |
| 17 to 20 | 3 | 6 |
| 21 to 24 | 21 | 18 |
| 25 to 28 | 18 | 15 |
| 29 to 32 | 12 | 6 |
| 33 to 36 | 0 | 8 |
| 37 to 40 | 11 | 8 |
| 41 to 44 | 16 | 14 |
| 45 to 48 | 21 | 17 |
| 49 to 52 | 28 | 11 |
| 53 to 56 | 12 | 13 |
| 57 to 60 | 4 | 7 |
| 61 to 64 | 8 | 3 |
| 65 to 68 | 9 | 9 |
| 69 to 72 | 15 | 26 |
| 73 to 76 | 6 | 9 |
| 77 to 80 | 39 | 38 |
| 81 to 84 | 4 | 6 |
| 85 to 88 | 6 | 6 |
| 89 to 92 | 2 | 4 |
| 93 to 96 | 2 | 2 |
| 97 to 100 | 3 | 1 |
| 101 to 104 | 0 | 1 |
| 105 to 108 | 1 | 1 |
| 109 to 112 | 8 | 2 |
| 113 to 116 | 6 | 6 |
| 117 to 120 | 0 | 2 |
| 121 to 124 | 6 | 2 |
| 125 to 128 | 13 | 5 |
| 129 to 132 | 3 | 2 |
| 133 to 136 | 4 | 6 |
| 137 to 140 | 2 | 1 |
| 141 to 144 | 0 | 2 |
| 145 to 148 | 1 | 2 |
| 149 to 152 | 3 | 1 |
| 153 to 156 | 0 | 1 |
| 157 to 160 | 0 | 0 |
| 161 to 164 | 0 | 1 |
| 165 to 168 | 0 | 0 |
| 169 to 172 | 1 | 0 |
| 173 to 176 | 8 | 10 |
| 177 to 178 | 5 | 2 |
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.
ANNA: Poulet? That's "chicken" in French. CLAIRE: Oh don't tell me that! Really?
CLAIRE: It's music. ANNA: Where's it comin' from? They listen.
ANNA: It's haunted! It's really haunted! CLAIRE: What happened?
ANNA: But she did it wrong! ABIGAIL: __.To complete the curse, the witch must have an "identifier". Something that belonged to the intended victim. From the pages of the book, s…
ANNA: E.P. Emmaline Partridge! ABIGAIL: If I read this correctly, the spell trapped those poor people in limbo, between this world and the next. ANNA: Their ghosts are stuck in the hotel! But we can help 'em! ABIGAIL: Tomorrow night is all Hollow's Eve, the night of the curse.
Exhibit B: every 100 lines
Out of every 100 lines with a known speaker, 52 are women's.
301 lines from women, 274 from men.
- Women
- Men
Exhibit C: who's in it
8 women and 10 men in the cast. 8 women and 9 men from it get lines.
Characters
With lines
- Women
- Men
Exhibit D: who gets heard
The first woman speaks at line 2 of 650.
The longest stretch with no woman speaking runs 20 lines.
Every line of dialogue, first to last
- First line by a woman
- Longest stretch with no woman speaking
Words spoken
Women speak 51% of the words (3,758), men 49% (3,630). Women have 52% 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
34
Two men
13
Exhibit F: behind the camera
1 of the 9 people in these jobs is a woman.
Across the whole crew, 30% of the people whose gender is listed are women.
- Directed by
- D.J. MacHale (man)
- Written by
- D.J. MacHale (man)
- Produced by
- Iain Paterson (man)
- Shot by
- Stephen McNutt (man)
- Edited by
- Barry Zetlin (man)
- Music by
- Louis Febre (man)
- Production design by
- Phil Dagort (man)
- Costumes by
- Tom Bronson (man)
- Cast by
- Melissa Skoff (woman)
The crew, department by department
-
Production
5 women, 5 men, 3 not listed
-
Costume & Make-Up
2 women, 2 men, 3 not listed
-
Art
0 women, 2 men, 3 not listed
-
Directing
1 women, 1 men, 3 not listed
-
Sound
0 women, 2 men, 3 not listed
-
Other crew
0 women, 1 men, 3 not listed
-
Visual Effects
0 women, 2 men, 1 not listed
-
Camera
0 women, 1 men
- Women
- Men
- Gender not listed on TMDB
Exhibit G: how old the stars were
Women: 30 on average. Men: 40 on average.
The top-billed cast, at the film's release.
Women
Shira Roth 11, Lindsay Ridgeway 12, Kirsten Dunst 15, Melora Hardin 30, Nia Peeples 35, Amzie Strickland 78
Men
Steve Guttenberg 39, Alastair Duncan 39, Michael McShane 42
About this analysis
Our parser read the script: 178 scenes and 650 lines of dialogue. The bechdeltest.com rating comes from that site’s readers. How the test works
