"Thelma & Louise" by Ridley Scott: a review

Thelma and Louise” has an unusual story in which two women from unexciting backgrounds try to look for some happiness, and find it only after they become outlaws. Gina Davies plays the role of Thelma Yvonne Dickinson, and Susan Sarandon plays the role of Louise Elizabeth Sawyer in this movie.

Thelma is married to a rather controlling man, while Louise is still unmarried. Louise works as a waitress. The two decide to take a two-day vacation from their otherwise dull lives. Louise owns a nice car, and they start their journey in this car. They reach a bar called Silver Bullet. Here Thelma dances with one of the men whose name is Harlan Puckett (played by Timothy Carthart). After dancing, Harlan tries to rape drunken Thelma in the car parking area. Hearing Thelma cry out, Louise picks Thelma’s gun, and points it at Harlan, asking him to back off! At first Harlan does hesitate. But soon he becomes defiant, adding obscene remarks, which prompt Louise to accidentally pull the trigger. Harlan dies on the spot, and the two realize the implications. Thelma does suggest going to police station. But Louise is not certain that anybody would believe the truth, in light of the fact that Thelma was quite drunk. Louise also gets scared of being prosecuted.

The two ladies now plan to go to Mexico. But Louise has an unhappy past, because of which she is unwilling to travel through Texas. Therefore, they move towards west. Here, they meet J.D., (played by Brad Pitt) who is a robber on parole. J.D. is a good-looking man, and soon Thelma starts liking him. On her advise, Louise allows J.D. to hitch hike with them. Louise, in the meanwhile, calls up her boyfriend requesting him to transfer her lifetime savings through Western Union. The following day, her boyfriend Jimmy (played by Michael Madsen) surprises her. He comes personally to hand over the monies. At the other end, J.D. reveals to Thelma about his past, and how he robbed different people. Jimmy and Louise spend the night together, and so do Thelma and J.D. The following morning J.D. decamps with Louise’s savings. The two ladies realize this only after they exchanged notes on their respective boyfriends. Now it is normally calm and organized Louise’s turn to panic, so Thelma takes charge. She starts earning by following J.D.’s ways. The first thing she does is stealing from a store.

In the meanwhile, FBI is looking for them. FBI detective Slocomb is in charge of the case. He talks to both Jimmy and J.D. From them he learns about Louise’s side of the story. The detective also finds out about Louise’s past and the reason she left Texas with a lack of medical bill coding for her family. All this makes detective compassionate towards her. He comes into contact with Louise, but is not able to persuade her to return.

Soon the two women get habituated to their new lifestyle. Thelma changes from docile lady to a more decisive, aggressive, and boisterous person. Detective Slocomb does catch up with them eventually, but not before they’d managed to burn down a tanker truck because the truck driver passed some obscene remarks and refused to apologize. They also took away a gun from a policeman who stopped them for crossing speed limits. However, when Slocombe tracks them down, they realize that they have to spend their lives in prison. The realization prompts them to take their car over the cliff. The film ends on a sad note as the two ladies who turned into outlaws due to circumstances chose to commit suicide.