2024 Entry #48 06-09-24 “Thelma & Louise” is a 1991 American crime drama film directed by Ridley Scott and written by Callie Khouri. The film stars Susan Sarandon (“The Rocky Horror Picture Show”, “The Hunger”, “Cradle Will Rock”, “Cloud Atlas”) and Geena Davis (“Tootsie”, “Will & Grace”, “She-Ra and the Princesses of Power”) as Louise and Thelma, two friends who embark on a road trip that ends up in unforeseen circumstances. The supporting cast includes Harvey Keitel (“Pulp Fiction”), Michael Madsen (“Sin City”), Christopher McDonald (“The Boys Next Door”), and Brad Pitt (“Less Than Zero”, “Interview with the Vampire”, “The Mexican”, “The Normal Heart”). Filming took place in California and Utah from June to August 1990.
I wanted to revisit this film more than 30 years after first seeing it because I remembered several of my lesbian friends having stickers and magnets that said “Thelma & Louise LIVE” on them, and also having seen “The Celluloid Closet” many times over in which Susan Sarandon discusses putting the big kiss in at the end of the film. It surprised me to see that there are no LGBTQ characters in this movie. Even the much lauded kiss is between two women that the film goes out of its way to present as heterosexual and are kissing in a show of solidarity before they drive off a cliff together and presumably die. I think this, sadly, just goes to show how in the early 90s, queer audiences were starved for images of ourselves and would glom onto anything that remotely suggested homosexuality. It’s still a good film, but it just serves to remind me of exactly how far we’ve come.
Still, that connection between LGBTQ+ audience members and this film has made it something of an icon.
