25th Anniversary Five-Part Mini Series Event
Thelma & Louise
Directed by Ridley Scott
Written by Callie Khouri
Released by MGM on May 24th, 1991
Nominated for Six Oscars
To celebrate the anniversary of this bonafide girls gone wild classic from 1991, Team Experience is revisiting the picture, tag-team style all week long (like we did with Rebecca & Silence of the Lambs, y'all!).
While the film begins in Arkansas, we're taking an alternate route. Grabbing the keys to begin this road trip is our own dazzling female duo over in Los Angeles, Anne Marie and Margaret. - Editor
Pt 1 by Anne Marie and Margaret
Anne Marie: 00:01. Fade in on an opening credit sequence that pulls every single late 80s/early 90s cliche. Heat-baked street? Check. Twanging guitar? Check. Harmonica solo? Check.
Margaret: Based on this alone, I would definitely expect to be watching a serious action-drama about a lovable renegade cop
Anne Marie: I mean, it's in that vein. As Susan Sarandon has pointed out (love this woman, and love how much she talks about this movie), Thelma & Louise basically is an outlaw buddy movie in the vein of Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid.
01:10 But more on that later. Right now let's talk about HANS ZIMMER WROTE THIS SCORE?!?
Margaret: Hans Zimmer contains multitudes.
Anne Marie: As long as those multitudes contain at least one louder-than-necessary instrument solo. In all seriousness, there is a lot of talent behind Thelma & Louise, which you get to see just in the opening credits roll: Besides our two incredible leading ladies, the incomparable Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon, we've got baby Brad Pitt without an ounce of baby fat on him, Harvey Keitel (happy belated birthday!), Michael Madsen, Christopher McDonald, and it's written by Callie Khouri, who would one day give us Nashville. Not the Altman.
Margaret: And never let us forget character actor workhorse Stephen Tobolowsky, who also appears here in compliance with state law. I also often forget that this is a Ridley Scott film. It doesn't have a "Ridley Scott film" kind of place in our cultural discourse, though it's got at least as much pop permanence as Blade Runner. (When was the last time Blade Runner got referenced in a Country radio hit?)
Anne Marie: Definitely.
02:15. Moving on, we introduce Our Fair Heroes. It's actually a great bit of screenwriting, because we learn exactly who each lady is just by this introduction
Margaret: There's our Louise (La Sarandon in finest form), who we meet at her restaurant job as she is passing some sage advice to the young patrons she’s serving about avoiding cigarettes ("It ruins your sex drive,") immediately after which she lights up in the corner of the kitchen while dialing up Thelma.
Anne Marie: Because nothing can ruin Susan Sarandon's sex drive.
02:22 When Thelma picks up, she's all hair (only Geena Davis can pull off that grown out mullet) and chaotic meekness, following behind her husband Darryl as he primps and preens and bosses her around.
Margaret: As you’ve often said, you know when someone’s bad guy because he wears a lot of jewelry and has a mustache. You get the strong feeling he’s about to go sell some cars. He’s slimy, and very dismissive of his wife, but Davis is so effervescent it almost neutralizes his negativity.
06:10 After he leaves, we're treated to a quick montage of each of our leading ladies and their different approaches to packing for their planned excursion. Louise stacks Ziploc bags of neatly rolled clothes into a perfectly accommodating suitcase. Thelma opts to dump whole drawers into her luggage.
Anne Marie: The packing montage is short, but if slowed down gives us some big reveals about Thelma and Louise. Thelma is a blur of limbs and hair as she throws things willy-nilly into her suitcase. Louise carefully puts everything in its place. Thelma stumbles through her messy house. Louise washes out one glass from the sink and dries it. So what we have are two women who are, in their own ways, utterly alone: Thelma, who has been swallowed whole by the clutter of domestic demands, and Louise, whose time is so empty that she must make an event out of packing a bag or cleaning a glass.
Margaret: If this came out now, imagine how many buzzfeed quizzes about whether you're a Thelma or a Louise would crowd our Facebook newsfeeds! And look, I found one!
Anne Marie: Considering I'm sitting next to three piles of books and an unmade bed, I'd say I'm a Thelma aspiring to be a Louise.
Margaret: I'm a Louise. Especially when it comes to packing.
Anne Marie: And that, among many reasons, is why we're such great friends.
07:09 Let's take a road trip!
Margaret: Only after I get me one of those headscarves sarandon is wearing as she rolls up in that ‘66 Thunderbird convertible. Damn, though. The word iconic is hideously overused but this is definitely the time for it: I C O N I C
Anne Marie: Absolutely! And the perfect time for a selfie! After inventing and immediately perfecting the selfie courtesy of a polaroid camera, our two intrepid heroines drive off in Louise's thunderbird to see what adventure awaits. (But not without packing Chekhov's gun.)
Margaret: Thelma loosens up so significantly the further they drive away from town. After she confesses that the way she got Darryl to "let her" go was to not tell him, she really digs into her truancy. Lighting a cigarette and posing a little bit with it (“Thelma, what are you doing?” “....Smokin’.”) and making Louise laugh at her.
Their dynamic is so lived-in. The friendship always feels real and deep.
Anne Marie: Susan Sarandon, as previously mentioned, is a goddess, but Geena Davis's performance as meek and naive Thelma at the beginning of this movie is startling, especially considering that at 6', she towers over everyone (except Sarandon).
Margaret: Susan Sarandon is 5'7" but you wouldn't know they were so far apart in height.
Anne Marie: Susan Sarandon is taller than I am?!? That shouldn't be a surprise, I usually have a thing for taller women.
11:30 ANYWAY, when Thelma and Louise drive up to the bar, dusk falls and the plot kicks into gear with... a line dance?
Thelma: You said you and me was gonna get out of town and for once just really let our hair down. Well darlin', look out' cuz my hair is coming down.
Louise: Changed my mind. i’m gonna have a margarita and a shot of cuervo on the side
Okay, y'all, story time. I grew up in a state where line dancing is a very popular passtime at bars, and I have to say. This is very accurate. From the dance steps to the blue eyeshadow, not a lot has changed in the line dancing bar scene since 1991.
Margaret: Thelma is so loosened up at this point she almost doesn't need the shots she's exuberantly downing. Her hair is coming down, indeed.
13:10 Louise, on the other hand, is playing it more cool and cautious.
Anne Marie: Louise is having none of the suitors that come up to their table. She's having none of men in general. It's either queer or it's misandrist, but the way she dismisses men with a cigarette in her hand is definite goals for me.
Margaret: And then Thelma has to go and undo all that excellent man-deflecting. Thelma, as it turns out, is a total Woo Girl.
Anne Marie: Yes, but one that hasn't hatched yet.
Margaret: 16:00 She sails off to dance with the world's most obvious scumbag, and in that moment we are all Louise.
Anne Marie: Thelma and Harlan (Scumbag) head drunkenly to the dance floor, then give Louise the slip while she's in the bathroom. Unfortunately everyone knows where this is going.
Margaret: It's a testament to the quality of the screenplay and the direction that this scene is hideously queasy to watch long before he lays a hand on her.
Anne Marie: 19:20. Outside now. I don't know how I feel about this scene. With all the discussion lately about rape and assault on TV, I found myself wondering if it had to be attempted rape that started this narrative.
In the future, when a woman's crying like that -- she isn't havin' any fun!"
Anne Marie: It adds something very Feminist Avenger to the story that the first man killed is a rapist caught in the act, but on the other hand, Butch and Sundance didn't need a moral imperative. They just liked robbing banks.
Margaret: Ultimately, though, the act of pulling the trigger feels rooted in pride. Louise had stormed in with the gun and neutralized the threat. The attempted rape was horrible, and the physical assault was brutal, but Louise had shut it down.
21:29 It was when he refused to slink away without taking another strike at humiliating them that she fired the gun. It wasn't an accident. It wasn't even self-defense.
Anne Marie: True. We're never asked to feel pity for Harlan, but making it a crime of anger and pride rather than defense does change the narrative. It's less about victimhood and more about "Fuck this asshole he deserves it." Which is more or less the moral code Thelma and Louise use for the rest of the movie.
23:45 While Thelma cries, careening through the streets, Louise sits (mostly silently) trying to figure out what to do. Pulled to the side of the rode, Thelma pitifully brushes her hair and Louise tries to gather. She's going to stop for coffee and "figure out what to do". But what on earth can that be since she refuses to go to the police?