#timothy caghart

[greenhatsinthesky]

lockdown film no. 35 - Thelma & Louise (1991) dir. Ridley Scott

15/05/2020

This was my first time seeing this film — I’d never seen it before, didn’t know what happened even though apparently everyone knows the end, all I knew was that it was a sort of buddy movie and it won best picture in ’91. I was very excited and good god I was not disappointed

- “you a little young to be smoking? it lowers your sex drive” *lights up*

- the premise of this feels a little like American honey. Terrible home life for one of the main characters and she just runs away 

- I literally always forget how fit Susan Sarandon is. Who gave her the right

- the south scares the absolute shit out of me. however, I would love to go dancing in a country bar as long as I wasn’t hate crimed

- the scene with thelma and Harlan was well done in the sense that I felt physically sick watching it. Also I was glad that it didn’t get to the point where he actually raped her, and we got small details like him kicking her feet wider because that added to a real horrible sense of dread and we know that he would have done it if Louise hadn’t come in with the gun. 

- “I’m in deep shit, Jimmy, Deep Shit, Arkansas.”

- I love the fact that thelma just had her entire suitcase with her while she was sunbathing. Also appreciated the details in that scene like her scuffed feet and the bruises on her knees because it was super consistent with what we’d seen so far. And I don’t like it when things are shiny especially in stuff like this

- good god brad Pitt is so sexy in this

- can’t cope with the guy doing curls when their car was getting filled up

- “How come you never told me about what happened to you in Texas?!” TRAUMA BABIE

- a really big part of me wants to be brad Pitt’s character in this. I want to be a polite cowboy who helps women realise they deserve more than they think they do. Maybe not the mass shoplifting and stealing vast amounts of money from said women, but

- geena Davis and brad Pitt’s chemistry was… impeccable. They acted the scenes they had together so well and even their sex scene was almost endearing because when jd was kissing down thelma’s stomach she said “wait” and he did and he rested his chin on her and they just looked at each for a bit before launching into that whole bit and even something as small as that made the whole thing feel like the both of them were really into what was going on

- when we realised that jd had taken their money it was one of the more heartbreaking moments in the film, cos he seemed legit. It was quite funny actually, when that reveal happened my mum said “it’s bad that he took all their money, but at least he gave thelma a good time. And that’s important”. We ended up having an unexpected but nice discussion on the importance of women’s pleasure

- watching thelma rob the store was easily one of the most entertaining things, and it was ace to see her character develop over the course of the film

- “there’s no such thing as justifiable robbery” “where’d you get this?” “stole it”

- i loved how thelma just said “ok” when Louise said that she wasn’t talking about Texas. She told her to drop it and she did and just said “it’s ok”. She didn’t apologise for asking because then it puts something on Louise to forgive her 

- the hold up with the police officer was one of the politest things id ever seen and it wasn’t out of either of their characters at this point. Thelma was more confident and probably drunk and basically channelling jd at this point and Louise was the one following her lead so it was an almost complete role reversal from the beginning which I loved

- acab apart from Harvey keitel

- the way that their appearances changed throughout the film was so interesting. At the start Thelma was kind of frothy and buzzy and gradually she became almost hardened by all that had happened but she didn’t lose the essence of her character. Her hair changed and her face seemed to get darker and almost more weathered but not in a way that beat her down, in a way that made her stronger. And louise looked different as well — they both picked up memorabilia on the way so by the end they’re both wearing hats from the people who have hurt them and Louise has the cop’s sunglasses. She changes as well but she also learns from thelma in a way that we wouldn’t have expected her to at the beginning of the film. The final lorry driver scene had this in that they were playing off each other and Louise was remembering how thelma handled the nazi police officer

- the locations were spectacular

- i guess one of the things that this films about is how much people can stand until they can’t stand it anymore. The recurring theme of the god awful truck driver is a really good example of this because the first two times they see him, first they yell at him, then they ignore him because they’re on the run from the law, and then when they meet him again they blow up his truck because it was too much. he’d gone too far every time, it wasn’t like the last time was any worse than the times before, but this time they’d decided they couldn’t let him pass them by

- it was a really nice bit of comedic relief having the guy on the bike and the “oh my god he’s a nazi” police officer

- the car chase in this is one of the better ones id seen. And the shot of all the cars following them from high up? i’m absolutely reeling

- i nearly shit myself when they almost drove right over the edge and then the helicopter came up. 

- oh my god speaking of the hats they blew off both their heads when the helicopter came up and they didn’t put them back on ! In that moment they’re stripped of any of the armour they’ve gathered over the course of what’s happened and it’s just them without any of the other stuff so they’re the most vulnerable we’ve seen them for a while

- when I first saw it I really wasn’t expecting the end and it still hit me a lot second time round. Nearly welled up a bit at the bit where Harvey keitel was running after their car in slow motion

- I was just talking to my mum about this and we both thought it was interesting how the story so easily could have been the sexual assault, and while the story wouldnt go the way that it would if Harlan hadn't almost raped thelma, the story doesn't become the trauma, it’s so much more layered than that

- i love this film. Im really glad it gets clout and im pleased that there can be films directed by men that are about women and that are done really really well. Please watch it