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Overall Rating
 Awesome: 42.59%
Worth A Look: 31.48%
Average: 11.11%
Pretty Bad: 3.7%
Total Crap: 11.11%
2 reviews, 42 user ratings
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| Thelma & Louise |
by Greg Muskewitz
"Fulsome, but still good, especially for performances."
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Liberating women's film, taken from a women's book (Callie Khouri --who also scripted), but directed by a man (Ridley Scott). The results are not bad, but I could have thought of better candidates. The direction is not the focus on this movie, because what Scott choses as his mise-en-scène becomes nothing more than an exercise in distracting shadows, smoke and fog. "Thelma & Louise" isn't about style, although the wide-eyed exterior photography is gorgeous, it's about the characters.Thelma (Geena Davis), an unappreciated housewife (married to the trailor-trashish Christopher McDonald) and Louise (Susan Sarandon), a waitress, hit the road for a vacation weekend. They murder an attempted rapist and all their plans crumble from there. On the lamb, cruising in a convertible T-Bird, eluding the law.
It's a pretty basic anti-hero (or heroine) story, a testosteroned chick-flick, and ultimately an anti-guy movie. (Though Harvey Keitel's sensible, instinctual cop is on "our" side.) The movie isn't about fairness --if anything it's unfair, because if this would have been a guy road movie, the law never would have caught them.
Sarandon and Davis are both good in their roles, and though they fluctuate back and forth between which one you like more, the performances are enjoyable. There is a character evolution between those two, while Keitel is plainly humane and McDonald is a stock stereotype.
The drawls are thickly applied (Davis just had to exclaim, "Geez, Louise!") and the final act brings on Scott's actionering/adventurous trademarks (blowing up a gasoline tanker, sticking a cop in his trunk, etc.) and that's when the drama stops being a drama and becomes overwrought and abysmal. Luckily, the bad taste is extinguishable.
There was a strong scene where Sarandon and her hubby reminese about their first meeting and her eye color. ("What did you say to me?"/ "That you had the most beautiful eyes."/ "And I closed my eyes and asked wat color they were. What did you say?"/ "That I didn't know."/ (She closes her eyes) "What color are they?"/ "Blue.") It was the realest thing "Thelma & Louise" had to offer.
With Brad Pitt.Final Verdict: B.
link directly to this review at http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=2450&reviewer=172
originally posted: 10/16/00 07:05:05
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OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2005 Brisbane Film Festival. For more in the 2005 Brisbane Film Festival series, click here.
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USA
02-Jul-1991 (R)
UK
N/A
Australia
N/A
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