Thelma & Louise (1991) - IMDb IMDb ‘Generation KKK’: Why A&E is Considering Rebranding Their Show After Backlash 22 December 2016 4:51 PM, UTC There was an error trying to load your rating for this title. Some parts of this page won't work property. Please reload or try later. X Beta I'm Watching This! Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends. Error From $2.99 (SD) on Amazon Video ON DISC An Arkansas waitress and a housewife shoot a rapist and take off in a '66 Thunderbird.

Director: Jerry Seinfeld, Demetri Martin and Female Bros: The 16 Best Web Series Of 2016 21 December 2016 7:00 AM, -08:00 | Indiewire a list of 26 titles created 26 Mar 2011 a list of 23 titles created 02 Oct 2012 a list of 38 titles created 14 Jun 2013 a list of 29 titles created 19 Mar 2014 a list of 22 titles created 08 Feb 2015 Search for " Thelma & Louise " on Amazon.com Connect with IMDb Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. You must be a registered user to use the IMDb rating plugin. Won 1 Oscar. Another 17 wins & 39 nominations. See more awards » Videos Two NYC cops arrest a Yakuza member and must escort him when he's extradited to Japan. Director: Ridley Scott A journalist duo go on a tour of serial killer murder sites with two companions, unaware that one of them is a serial killer himself.

Director: Dominic Sena The story about two sons of a stern minister -- one reserved, one rebellious -- growing up in rural Montana while devoted to fly fishing. Director: Robert Redford A man tries to transport an ancient gun called The Mexican, believed to carry a curse, back across the border, while his girlfriend pressures him to give up his criminal ways. Director: Gore Verbinski Epic tale of three brothers and their father living in the remote wilderness of 1900s USA and how their lives are affected by nature, history, war, love and betrayal. Director: Edward Zwick In Detroit, a lonely pop culture geek marries a call girl, steals cocaine from her pimp, and tries to sell it in Hollywood. Meanwhile, the owners of the cocaine - the Mob - track them down in an attempt to reclaim it. Director: Tony Scott Teenage boys discover discipline and camaraderie on an ill-fated sailing voyage. Director: Ridley Scott A vampire tells his epic life story: love, betrayal, loneliness, and hunger. Director: Neil Jordan After a prank goes disastrously wrong, a group of boys are sent to a detention center where they are brutalized; over 10 years later, they get their chance for revenge.

Director: Barry Levinson A duel between two feuding Napoleonic officers eventually evolves into a decades-long series of duels, after each bout - for various reasons - ends unresolved. Director: Ridley Scott Death, who takes the form of a young man, asks a media mogul to act as a guide to teach him about life on Earth and in the process he falls in love with his guide's daughter. Director: Martin Brest True story of Heinrich Harrer, an Austrian mountain climber who became friends with the Dalai Lama at the time of China's takeover of Tibet. Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud Edit Storyline Louise is working in a diner as a waitress and has some problems with her boyfriend Jimmy, who, as a musician, is always on the road. Thelma is married to Darryl who likes his wife to stay quiet in the kitchen so that he can watch football on TV. One day they decide to break out of their normal life and jump in the car and hit the road. Their journey, however, turns into a flight when Louise kills a man who threatens to rape Thelma. They decide to go to Mexico, but soon they are hunted by American police.

Written by Harald Mayr <marvin@bike.augusta.de> Somebody said get a life... so they did. Genres: Rated R for strong language, and for some violence and sensuality | See all certifications » Parents Guide: 24 May 1991 (USA) See more » Also Known As: Thelma and Louise See more » Filming Locations: Did You Know? Trivia Then struggling actor George Clooney auditioned five times for Ridley Scott for the part of J.D. that went to Brad Pitt . See more » Goofs In the Thunderbirds of that era, when the top was down there was very little room to put anything in the trunk as the top took up most of this area. When they are putting the luggage and fishing gear in the trunk, with the top down there would be no room for all the luggage and the top in the trunk. The most that could have gone in the trunk would be two small overnight cases and no room for the fishing pole etc. See more » Quotes Thelma : Driiive, Louise! Drive! Drive the car! Go! Go! Go go go go go go! Louise : What is it? What happened?

[Thelma holds up money] Louise : You robbed the store? You robbed the whole damn store? Thelma : Well, we needed the money. Thelma : I'm sorry, we needed the money, now we got it. Louise : Oh shoot! Oh shoot, Thelma! [...] Produced by Stewart Levine for Oliverea Productions Ltd.

Courtesy of MCA Records User Reviews (Mexico) – See all my reviews The road movie is traditionally a male genre, relying on the sense of freedom and independence that having one's own transport provides and which has usually been the privilege of men What is innovatory about "Thelma & Louise" is the way it reequips the genre for women Thelma (Geena Davis) is a housewife trapped in a meaningless marriage, Louise (Susan Sarandon) is a waitress in a not very significant relationship They decide to give themselves a little space by taking off for a weekend But when Louise shoots a man who is trying to rape Thelma, they are precipitated into a far more radical break with their past lives The setting of action in the American southwest and the acts of outlawry the women are obliged to commit in order to keep on the run give the film some of the feel of a Western What makes it nevertheless a women's film is that the relationship between the two principals is at the center of the story The various men they encounter, both the ones they leave behind and those they meet on the road have less importance for Thelma and Louise than the two women do for each other Predictably, the film met with hostility from some male viewers,

 on the grounds that the men were caricatured and that the film encouraged violence 31 of 52 people found this review helpful.

Was this review helpful to you? Yes See the Cast of 'Thelma and Louise' Then and Now See the Cast of 'Thelma and Louise' Then and Now March 7, 2014 @ 1:22 PM MGM Released in 1991 and directed by Ridley Scott, 'Thelma and Louise' starred Geena Davis as housewife Thelma, convinced by the headstrong Louise (Susan Sarandon) to go on a fun road trip that quickly devolves into a nightmare for the two women, turning them into fugitives from the law. The film was a commercial and critical success, was nominated for six Academy Awards -- including Best Actress for both Davis and Sarandon -- and won the Oscar for Best Screenplay. Twenty-three years later, we take a look back at the cast of the film and see what they're up to these days. Susan Sarandon, Louise Elizabeth Sawyer MGM/Getty Images Then: Susan Sarandon played Louise Sawyer, a headstrong waitress with a mysterious past who invites Thelma on a two-day vacation that goes awry.

Sarandon was previously known for roles in 'The Witches of Eastwick' and 'Bull Durham.' Now: Sarandon went on to appear in 'The Client,' 'Little Women,' 'Stepmom,' 'Elizabethtown,' 'Enchanted,' 'Speed Racer' and 'The Lovely Bones.' She recently guest starred on '30 Rock,' 'Louie' and 'Mike and Molly,' and had a recurring role on 'The Big C.' More recently, she appeared in the films 'That's My Boy,' 'Cloud Atlas' and 'The Big Wedding,' and she can be seen next alongside Melissa McCarthy in 'Tammy.' Geena Davis, Thelma Yvonne Dickinson MGM/Getty Images Then: Geena Davis played the role of Thelma, a passive and put-upon housewife who lives under the rule of her controlling husband, Darryl, so she agrees to let loose for a vacation with Louise. Davis was known for roles in 'The Fly' and 'Beetlejuice.' Now: Davis has since appeared in films like 'A League of Their Own,' 'Speechless,' 'The Long Kiss Goodnight' and the 'Stuart Little' films.

She starred on the short-lived shows 'The Geena Davis Show' and 'Commander in Chief,' and more recently guest starred on a couple of episodes of the A&E miniseries 'Coma.' Davis also had a small role in the indie film 'In a World...' in 2013. Since 2007, she has been the head of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, which tracks the presence of female characters in media aimed at children and works with the entertainment industry to increase the amount of characters in that programming. Harvey Keitel, Detective Hal Slocumb MGM/Getty Images Then: Harvey Keitel, star of classic Martin Scorsese films like 'Mean Streets' and 'Taxi Driver,' played Detective Hal Slocumb, who is tracking the women after they kill a man for attempting to assault Thelma.

Now: Keitel's lengthy resume includes roles in films like 'Reservoir Dogs,' 'Pulp Fiction,' 'From Dusk Till Dawn' and 'Little Nicky.' In 2012, he appeared in the Wes Anderson film 'Moonrise Kingdom,' and this month he can be seen in Anderson's new film 'The Grand Budapest Hotel.' He also appears in the upcoming films 'God Only Knows' and 'Two Men in Town.' Michael Madsen, Jimmy Lennox MGM/Getty Images Then: Michael Madsen played Jimmy Lennox, Louise's boyfriend who sends her life savings to her and then visits her in Texas when he realizes she's taking off for good. Madsen was still a relative newcomer who also appeared in Oliver Stone's 'The Doors.' Now: Madsen went on to appear with Harvey Keitel again in Quentin Tarantino's 'Reservoir Dogs,' and also starred in 'Wyatt Earp,' 'Species,' 'Donnie Brasco' and reunited with Tarantino for the 'Kill Bill' films.

More recently, he starred in 'The Killing Jar,' 'Piranhaconda' and 'I'm in Love with a Church Girl.' In 2012, he appeared on the UK edition of 'Celebrity Big Brother,' and he recently guest starred on 'The Mob Doctor' and 'Hawaii Five-0.' Christopher McDonald, Darryl Dickinson MGM/Getty Images Then: Christopher McDonald played Darryl Dickinson, Thelma's controlling jerk of a husband. McDonald previously starred in 'Grease 2' and 'Breakin',' but had yet to really establish himself as an actor. Now: McDonald has since established quite the resume, and appeared in films like 'Quiz Show,' 'Happy Gilmore' (in which he memorably played Adam Sandler's rival), 'The Faculty,' 'Requiem for a Dream' and 'The House Bunny.' He had recurring roles on 'The Sopranos' and 'Boardwalk Empire,' and recently appeared in episodes of 'Body of Proof' and 'Kirstie.' He also recently starred in the films 'The Collection,' 'Not Fade Away' and 'About Last Night.' Brad Pitt, J.D.

MGM/Getty Images Then: Brad Pitt was a then-unknown actor when he landed the role of a drifter named J.D., whom Thelma and Louise pick up. Thelma sleeps with him before he takes off with Louise's life savings. Back then, another unknown actor by the name of George Clooney also tried out for the role of J.D. Clooney, and Pitt would eventually become friends with and star with Clooney in the 'Ocean's Eleven' trilogy. Now: Pitt has become a major A-list star, of course. Since then he's made his mark with starring roles in films like 'Seven,' 'Fight Club,' the aforementioned 'Ocean's' trilogy, 'Inglourious Basterds' and 'Mr. and Mrs. Smith,' where he met his partner Angelina Jolie, with whom he shares several children, both natural and adopted. More recently, he appeared in the films 'World War Z' and 'The Counselor,' and he appeared in and produced '12 Years a Slave,' for which he, along with his co-producers, received an Academy Award for Best Picture.

He can be seen next in the David Ayer World War II film 'Fury.' 'Thelma & Louise': The Last Great Film About Women - The Atlantic The Atlantic 'Thelma & Louise': The Last Great Film About Women Most Popular The movie came out two decades ago, but its message has been lost MGM When it was released in the summer of 1991, Thelma & Louise was declared "the first movie I've ever seen which told the downright truth" by a lesbian activist in Los Angeles and a "paean to transformative violence" by commentator John Leo. New York Daily News columnist Richard Johnson complained that it was "degrading to men" and "justifies armed robbery, manslaughter and chronic drunken driving as exercises in consciousness raising." With a handful of exceptions, women loved it. The movie starred Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis as friends who set off on a road trip and become outlaws after Sarandon's character shoots a would-be rapist. May marked its 20th anniversary.

In 1992, screenwriter Callie Khouri became one of a handful of women to win an Academy Award for best original screenplay, and Thelma & Louise earned more than $45 million at the U.S. box office. Sarandon and Davis were each nominated in the Best Actress category, and director Ridley Scott was nominated for Best Director. The film smuggled its politics in under the guise of two happy-go-lucky gals taking a road trip together. At a screening of "Thelma & Louise" earlier this month, I was struck by how many lines of dialogue I remembered word for word. I was only 9 when it came out in theaters and I didn't see it until many years after it was released. When I finally did, at age 25, I was electrified. At 28, I was again entranced, silently mouthing my favorite lines along with Sarandon and Davis, laughing semi-hysterically at every sad-funny scene featuring Thelma's twitchy-eyed sexist jerk of a husband, and choking back a sob when Louise bade her final farewell to Jimmy. After the screening, there was a panel discussion of how far women had come twenty years later.

"This movie would never get made today," sighed one of the panelists, and the audience members murmured their assent. It's shocking enough that it was distributed in 1991, but at least back then American women were experiencing something like momentum: Anita Hill stood up for herself at Clarence Thomas's confirmation hearings, Callie Khouri won an Oscar, and, when four women were simultaneously elected to the United States Senate, 1992 was dubbed the "Year of the Woman." This year, the number of women in Congress dropped for the first time since 1978. Last year , women held only 15.7 percent of board seats and 14.4 percent of executive officer positions in Fortune 500 companies. A new study shows that the number of women working as writers and directors on prime-time television programs dropped significantly in the 2010-11 season. Women now account for only 15 percent of writers on the major television networks' prime-time dramas, comedies, and reality shows, down from 29 percent in the 2009-10 season.

Only 11 percent of directors in this year's television season were women, compared with 16 percent last season, and only 25 percent of series creators, producers, executive producers, directors, writers, editors and directors of photography were women, representing a decline of two percentage points from last season. By every significant measure of social, political, and cultural power, today's women are losing ground. The cultural climate of 2011 appears even less likely to produce a movie of comparable significance than it was 20 years ago. Thelma & Louise was originally advertised as a lighthearted female buddy pic (see the original trailer , which I initially mistook for a parody). It smuggled its politics in under the guise of two happy-go-lucky gals taking a road trip together; the trailer did not even hint at its darker core. But this was no romp—it was revolutionary, the first film in a long time to tell the truth about women's lives.

Not only did it star two women, but their friendship was the film's central subject, the story was written by a woman, and those stars were, at the time, 35 and 45—well past their prime by Hollywood's ever-narrowing standards of physical perfection. Though portrayed as sexually attractive, Davis and Sarandon had more to do than sit around looking pretty. There are no such movies today. The Bechdel test (named for cartoonist Alison Bechdel) is a means of assessing a movie's treatment of its female characters. In order to pass the test, a movie must have: (1) at least two women in it, (2) who talk to each other, (3) about something other than a man or men. A popular variant of the test additionally requires that both women have names. Twenty years ago, Thelma & Louise passed the Bechdel test easily. I can think of only three widely distributed movies that passed in the last year: Something Borrowed, Bridesmaids, and The Help. None approached the depth or level of nuance of Thelma & Louise, and only The Help featured actresses of the same caliber as Davis and Sarandon.

Bridesmaids is an enjoyably ribald comedy that dips a tentative toe in the darker waters of changing friendships, loneliness, and disillusionment. It's frivolous and fun, but hardly earth-shattering, despite the tremendous amount of credit its makers were awarded for assembling a movie with a predominantly female cast. The overwrought and forgettable Something Borrowed only passes the Bechdel test on a technicality: Kate Hudson and Ginnifer Goodwin spend about ten minutes of screen time discussing something other than a man or men. (That "something" is their longstanding friendship, which Goodwin's character ultimately trades in for a man). Though inspiringly female-centric, The Help is about women's lives rather than individual women; it's not focused enough to create main characters as vivid and enduring as Thelma & Louise. Thelma & Louise is powerful in part because it's about more than friendship. Movies that examine the bonds between women are few and far between, but they exist, from Beaches to Terms of Endearment, The Color Purple, Steel Magnolias, Fried Green Tomatoes, and A League of Their Own.

Thelma & Louise transcends the genre; it's about transformation and liberation that at once intensely personal and deeply political. It's about escaping, however fantastically, the agonizing constraints of gender, class, time, and place. "Something's crossed over in me and I can't go back," explains Thelma, "I mean, I just couldn't live." She has lost the desire and even the capacity to return to her old life of downtrodden domesticity and her brutish, domineering husband. Earlier in the film Louise tells her, "You get what you settle for," and, by the movie's end, both women are through with settling. "I don't remember ever feelin' this awake," says Thelma as they drive through the desert in the middle of the night, leaving their old lives behind. "Everything looks different. You know what I mean ... Everything looks new. Do you feel like that? Like you've got something to look forward to?" In today's movies, getting a ring from a man has replaced authentic moments of personal transformation and spiritual awakening as the high point of women's lives.

More On Movies Get Over 'Ferris Bueller,' Everyone Callie Khouri's triumphant final image of the two heroines locking hands as Louise drives them over a cliff is impossible to forget. Some feminists fretted that this ending represented the ultimate punishment for the women's defiant journey of self-discovery. Although it's implied that they commit suicide—we do not actually see them die—this was still a choice that they made, and one that struck them, and many viewers, as preferable to life in prison or death by lethal injection. If they were only able to live on their own terms for a single lost weekend, at least they would grant themselves the dignity of dying on those terms as well. In the world of the film, what other choice did they have? As Louise says to Thelma when Thelma suggests that they turn themselves in, "Who's gonna believe [us]? We just don't live in that kind of world." We still don't. When asked in an interview why her heroines commit suicide at the film's end, Callie Khouri famously responded: "To me, the ending was symbolic, not literal ... We did everything possible to make sure you didn't see a literal death.

That you didn't see the car land, you didn't see a big puff of smoke come up out of the canyon. You were left with the image of them flying. They flew away, out of this world and into the mass unconscious. Women who are completely free from all the shackles that restrain them have no place in this world. The world is not big enough to support them ... I loved that ending and I loved the imagery. After all they went through, I didn't want anybody to be able to touch them." I share Khouri's sentiments about the ending, which I have always loved. To me, it represented not death or punishment but hope, and even a kind of radical, ultimate fulfillment. Today, movies about women end with a wedding. Even its proponents can hardly argue that the aim of marriage is to set women free. In 1991, even gossip columnist Liz Smith found Thelma & Louise's liberation troubling, particularly its sexual aspect. "Nobody in 'Thelma & Louise' worries about AIDS, using condoms or encountering a serial killer," Smith primly noted. Surely the number of Hollywood sex scenes that depict a character of any gender reaching for a condom mid-action is low.

What really bothered people is that "Thelma & Louise" understood and realistically portrayed the way women experience sex. Much has been made of Brad Pitt's performance, which was widely hailed as his breakout role. He played a sweet-talking hitchhiker/felon who shows Thelma "what all the fuss is about" in bed. Their scenes together are funny, touching, and genuinely erotic. Khouri knew that women like context—Thelma and her new friend didn't have time to go to dinner and get to know each other, but their chemistry is believably established in the scenes they share together outside of bed. The actual sex scene stayed with me for years not because Brad Pitt had such a nice body—though he did—but because he and Davis seemed to get along so well. You feel as if they like each other, not just each other's bodies. They flirt and tease and laugh and play together. It was her first taste of real intimacy with a man that made the sex so good for Thelma, not the way her lover's body looked in jeans (although she liked that too). That scene possessed a humanity that is absent from every major movie sex scene I've watched since.

Between Brad Pitt's enormously appealing performance as Davis's lover and Michael Madsen's touching turn as Sarandon's flawed but loving boyfriend, it's astonishing that anyone considered this movie anti-male. Even Harvey Keitel's Detective Slocumb was honest, compassionate, and kind. "Thelma & Louise" has unpleasant male characters, including a rapist, a compulsive harasser of women, and a nasty, child-like husband, but real life has rapists, harassers, and mean husbands too. I suspect critics were actually troubled by the fact that we don't get to know any male characters apart from their relationship with Thelma and/or Louise. As Janet Maslin explained in the New York Times in 1991, the real objection to Thelma & Louise was neither its violence nor its protagonists' purported misandry; rather, it was "something as simple as it is powerful: the fact that the men in this story don't really matter." For 129 glorious minutes, two women were the stars of their own lives, and their lives did not revolve around men.

Melissa Silverstein, who writes and edits a blog called "Women & Hollywood," was among the panelists at the screening I attended. "Thelma & Louise is still a touchstone for so many people because it has never been recreated," she observed. "When a movie is successful, it's usually recreated over and over and over again." Why didn't Thelma & Louise usher in a new era for women in Hollywood? As the reactions of certain critics in 1991 revealed, even smart, educated people are disturbed by female characters who assert control over their lives and bodies and aren't punished for it. And as Callie Khouri told The Observer in 2001 , "Bad guys get killed in every goddamn movie that gets made ... that guy was the bad guy and he got killed. It was only because a woman did it that there was any controversy at all." At least back then we got to have the controversy. Today, we don't make movies about women that are even worth fighting about.

Whenever I'm dispirited by the crassly sexist ethos that governs Hollywood (as well as television, politics, and the corporate world) today, I think of "Thelma and Louise" and remember a time, not so long ago, when women were allowed to be human, if only in the movies. How Geena Davis Almost Played Louise in ‘Thelma and Louise’ | Backstage How Geena Davis Almost Played Louise in ‘Thelma and Louise’ By Briana Rodriguez | Posted July 7, 2016, 11 a.m. Share: Tootsie Photo Source: Joel Kimmel Geena Davis , soon to be seen on Fox’s new series “The Exorcist,” has been part of our collective cinematic consciousness since she first appeared onscreen as April in “Tootsie.” She solidified her status with “A League of Their Own,” “Beetlejuice,” and, of course, “Thelma & Louise,” before founding the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media . We chatted with the Oscar winner about why playing Thelma was so impactful, how she pitched Ridley Scott for the part, and which actors she wants to star alongside next!

Which of your performances has left a lasting mark on you? The film that had the most impact definitely was “Thelma & Louise.” None of us expected the reaction that it got. It was so shocking. It was like a small-budget film, really, and we just hoped people would come, but that it got the reaction that it did was remarkable—from women, especially. I have people recognize me here and there, but women were like, “I have to tell you! Here’s what I thought! Here’s how many times I’ve seen it and who I saw it with.” It’s been 25 years this year! On whom do you have an acting crush? Well, I have crushes on actors, for sure! Oh God, so embarrassing. One time I was at the Oscars with my husband [Reza Jarrahy], and as we’re leaving, Hugh Jackman was in front of us. My husband knew I had a crush on him, and he goes, “Hey, my wife wants to meet you. She has a crush on you!” And his wife was with him! He was very sweet, but it took 20 minutes to get out of the theater so we’re just moving inch by inch.

Every once in a while he’d turn around and say hi, and I just kept turning to my husband saying, “I’m going to kill you.” But [in terms of acting] I have a huge crush on all the funny women. Amy Schumer and Tina Fey and Amy Poehler and Melissa McCarthy—I want to be in those movies. I really love everything they do. I hope it all turns into momentum. How did you get your SAG-AFTRA card? “Tootsie.” Yeah, that was my first audition, even, and I got cast! Do you have an audition horror story? There’s a funny story behind the casting of [“Thelma & Louise”]. Somebody slipped me the script and said, “This is great. Every actress in town wants to be in this movie.” I read it, but it had already been cast. Then we find out a few months later it all fell apart and there’s a different director now. I’m pretty sure it happened three times, that there were three sets of Thelmas and Louises before it was Susan [Sarandon] and me, all with different directors. Finally, Ridley [Scott] said he was going to direct it himself.

My agent had been calling Ridley’s office every week for a year to say, “Geena’s still interested. Can Geena see you?” So I went to this meeting with Ridley with a year’s worth of passion and enthusiasm. I had met with my acting coach, and we’d decided that I should play Louise. So I’m pitching him fervently about why I must play Louise. He listens for a while and goes, “So, in other words, you wouldn’t play Thelma.” There was a very slight pause and I said, “You know what’s interesting? As I’ve been hearing myself lobby for playing Louise, I realize that it doesn’t sound right. I should play Thelma.” And then I just made shit up about why I had to be Thelma! And I was. What was your worst survival job? Once I was acting I was able to make money. I knew from when I was 3 years old that I wanted to be an actor, and I majored in acting at Boston University. The first class was an orientation with about 100 incoming freshmen. The professor comes in and goes, “I have to tell you. You’ve chosen an incredibly difficult profession.

Maybe only 1 percent of you will be able to earn a living as an actor.” And I thought, Oh, these poor kids. I wish somebody had told them—like I was the one! I was just so positive. But maybe they were all thinking that, too. I certainly was. Thank God it worked out, because I didn’t have a backup plan! Inspired by this post? Check out our film audition listings ! Read Also: Looking Back On 'Thelma & Louise' 20 Years Later : NPR Looking Back On 'Thelma & Louise' 20 Years Later Embed Embed Looking Back On 'Thelma & Louise' 20 Years Later Looking Back On 'Thelma & Louise' 20 Years Later Embed Embed A still from the 1991 film Thelma & Louise, written by Callie Khouri and directed by Ridley Scott. The title characters, played by Geena Davis (right) and Susan Sarandon, have become icons of liberation. MGM/Photofest hide caption toggle caption MGM/Photofest LANGUAGE ADVISORY: Clips from the movie Thelma & Louise below contain profanity and adult subject matter.

Twenty years ago this month, two women tore across the American West in a green 1966 Thunderbird convertible and into movie history. Thelma and Louise weren't just liberated in a man's world; they were fighting mad — and unlike anything that had come out of Hollywood before. The pair entered the cultural lexicon. Women today still roar with laughter when they know they're having a Thelma and Louise moment. Callie Khouri in 2009. Since writing Thelma & Louise, Khouri has gone on to write and direct films like Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood and Mad Money. Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images Callie Khouri in 2009. Since writing Thelma & Louise, Khouri has gone on to write and direct films like Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood and Mad Money. Alberto E.

Rodriguez/Getty Images For the uninitiated, the story begins with two friends, played by Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon, as they set out for a weekend away, but their real journey begins at a roadside bar when Louise shoots and kills a man whom she catches attempting to rape Thelma. Knowing there's little chance the authorities will accept their story, the two women flee instead of reporting the incident. The movie's screenwriter, Callie Khouri, hadn't ever had a script produced when she wrote Thelma & Louise, and for a while, she hoped to direct it herself, with lesser-known stars in the title roles. But then Ridley Scott, the director of Alien and Blade Runner, got interested, and Davis and Sarandon signed on. Khouri ended up winning an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. But as she tells All Things Considered's Michele Norris, when she first started shopping the screenplay around Hollywood, a lot of people didn't get Thelma & Louise. "There were a lot of people who just didn't understand it," Khouri says. "When a script goes out they have people who read the script and write up the notes.

And some of the descriptions of it that I saw were just 180 degrees from what the intention of the story was, the tone, everything." Article continues after sponsorship "Shouldn't We Go To The Cops?" 'Shouldn't We Go To the Cops?' Credit: Copyright, MGM Studios Nailing that tone, for Khouri, meant grasping that even though progress had been made, women in 1991 still faced huge struggles. Thelma & Louise was her statement about what breaking free might look like, a fantasy that just happened to be funny and gritty and violent and awfully realistic looking. "It wasn't personal experience so much as it was a feeling about the way things were in the world," she says. "And looking around and saying supposedly women are making all these great strides toward equality, but let's be honest: It's still very much a man's world and you're still looked at through a very narrow filter. And if you step out of line the punishment is severe. And this movie speaks to that feeling I think that women have of not being looked at as 100 percent whole human beings." It was a feeling that many people shared with Khouri. And one that they keep sharing with her.

"Sometimes I'm surprised at how many people still have very visceral stories that they tell me in relationship to their experience of either seeing this movie or something that happened in their lives that made them relate to this movie very strongly. And I'm grateful that it resonates the way it does," she says. "I've got to tell you, I've heard some horrific tales along the way of things that have happened to people that they've felt, because I wrote this movie, that they could share with me. But at the same time, I think there's a more universal experience that a lot of women have of having that best friend and that one person in the world with whom they are completely themselves and when they are together the outside world doesn't ever really get all the way in. It's their world." Each of the male characters in the film is a different version of "that guy," disappointing in some way, perhaps even disgusting: Thelma's dim, restrictive husband, played by Christoper McDonald; Harvey Keitel's sympathetic but relentless cop; the charismatic young thief played by Brad Pitt; and Thelma's attacker Harlan (Timothy Carhart), who starts out just asking the women to dance.

"Every film, especially a road movie, has to have a villain," Khouri explains. "So the character of Harlan was certainly that. And then the husband, I think that's somewhat believable, and I mean that in terms of having to ask permission to go somewhere if you're going on a trip. Not really being in control of your money or any of that stuff. The kind of misogyny that I was showing was so commonplace as to not even be recognizable and I think in some ways that's why men took exception to it because it was finally being shown from a female point of view and therefore you could see what it was like on the other side of it and I think some men took great exception to it. "Not all men, by the way. If I had a nickel for every man who told me how much he loved the movie, I would have a huge mansion made of nickels. There are millions of men who enjoyed it every bit as much as I did writing it because it was an outlaw movie and people love outlaw movies." Susan Sarandon (left) as Louise and Geena Davis as Thelma in the 1991 film that won screenwriter Callie Khouri an Academy Award.

MGM/Photofest hide caption toggle caption MGM/Photofest Susan Sarandon (left) as Louise and Geena Davis as Thelma in the 1991 film that won screenwriter Callie Khouri an Academy Award. MGM/Photofest The movie became famous as much for its ending as its cliche-busting. In the closing scene, the women decide not to face justice, but to "just keep going," gunning the green T-bird over the edge of the Grand Canyon, into a soaring freeze frame. The scene plays out exactly the way Khouri imagined it. "To me the end of the movie was never meant to be a literal, 'They drive off a cliff and die' kind of moment," Khouri says. "It was a way of saying that this was a world in which they didn't believe there was the possibility of justice for them. That they didn't believe that anyone would ever see their side of it enough to know why they had done what they had done. And that this was just a way of letting them go and letting them stay who they were, who they had become. So I never saw it as a suicide.

And over the years, hearing other people talk about it, I realize it's like a half-full, half-empty glass of water test. Where some people will come up and go, 'I'm so glad you let them get away.' And other people are like, 'I can't believe you killed them.' To me, they got away." Is she doing anything to celebrate the anniversary of Thelma and Louise's escape? "Now that you bring it up, I think I might need to do some alone time with a bottle of Wild Turkey," Khouri says with a chuckle. "When I say alone I mean with 30 of my closest friends." Thelma & Louise - Rolling Stone Thelma & Louise All Stories Call it a comedy of shocking gravity. Thelma & Louise begins like an episode of I Love Lucy and ends with the impact of Easy Rider. It's a bumpy path between those points, and director Ridley Scott ( Black Rain ) and first-time screenwriter Callie Khouri don't cushion the ride. The film switches moods violently, and sometimes it just jerks your chain. But this is movie dynamite, detonated by award-caliber performances from Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon in the title roles.

More News All Stories Davis plays Thelma, a Arkansas housewife married to a cheating, verbally abusive salesman named Darryl (broadly caricatured by Christopher McDonald) whom she began dating when she was fourteen. "He's an asshole," says Thelma, "but most times I just let it slide." Sarandon plays Thelma's pal Louise, a waitress who is pushing forty and fed up with waiting for her musician boyfriend, Jimmy (subtly detailed by Michael Madsen), to stop roving and commit. Louise organizes a weekend fishing trip for herself and Thelma, who doesn't know how to fish. "Neither do I," says Louise, "but Darryl does it — how hard can it be?" That's the setup: two women putting drudgery and men behind them for a few days of rest and intelligent talk. But before they reach their destination, a hungry Thelma asks Louise to stop her '66 T-Bird convertible at a roadhouse, where Thelma knocks back three shots of Wild Turkey and dances with a local Romeo.

Louise thinks her friend is just blowing off steam until she catches the guy beating and trying to rape Thelma in the parking lot. Grabbing Darryl's gun (which Thelma brought along for protection), Louise presses the barrel into the rapist's neck and says, "Just for the future, when a woman's crying like that, she's not having any fun." He hitches up his pants and starts to leave but not before saying to Louise, "Suck my cock." Louise takes two steps back and fires a bullet into his face. The suddenness of the act — the man is no longer a threat — is shattering. Vividly shot by Adrian Biddle (Aliens) and edited by Thom Noble (Witness), the scene is made even more potent by Louise's whispered remark to the bloody victim: "You watch your mouth, buddy." In a stunningly poignant performance, Sarandon shows that the emotionally bruised Louise has been in a similar position before and has finally been pushed past her limit. The dazed women drive off and try to plan their next move. The cops have staked out their homes.

When Thelma phones Darryl, detective Hal Slocumbe (Harvey Keitel) urges the pair to stop running. Hal is the film's one sympathetic male character, and he doesn't ring true. Khouri — a Texas-born actress, video producer and former waitress — doesn't turn her movie into a man-hating tract, but she does show what a lifetime of male sexual threat and domination (disguised as paternalism) can do to women. Thelma and Louise — now outlaws — attempt to escape to a new life in Mexico, the movie offers vignettes that are comic, tragic and surreal, sometimes simultaneously. They pick up J.D., a hitchhiking hunk charmingly played by Brad Pitt. Thelma takes him to bed because she likes his body. "You could park a car in the shadow of Darryl's ass," she tells Louise. For once, Thelma has a sexual experience that isn't "completely disgusting." In bed, J.D. — using a hair dryer as a gun — teaches Thelma the art of armed robbery. Then he robs her. The experience pushes Thelma over the line; she knocks over a convenience store using the J.D. method.

"I know it's crazy," she tells Louise, "but I just feel like I've got a knack for this shit." Swilling booze and howling like a dog, Thelma heeds the call of the wild. But Davis, who has never been better, keeps Thelma rooted in reality. Crime has taught her to express herself; she won't go back to a cage. Surrender doesn't suit Louise, either. She knows the police won't buy the truth because "we just don't live in that kind of world." Besides, she says, "I don't want to end up on the damned Geraldo show." The banter doesn't disguise the terror these women feel, but driving through Utah's Canyonlands — after blowing up the gas tank of a semi whose driver offered to lick them all over — they achieve a kind of serenity. As the film plunges toward its lacerating climax, some may have conflicting feelings about Thelma and Louise: Are they feminist martyrs or bitches from hell? Neither is the case. They're flesh-and-blood women out to expose the blight of sexism. Khouri's script isn't about rage or revenge; it's about waste.

Director Scott, whose films (Alien, Blade Runner) are noted for their slick surface, cuts to the marrow this time. This wincingly funny, pertinent and heartbreaking road movie means to get under your skin, and it does. Don’t Miss a Story Sign up for our newsletter to receive breaking news directly in your inbox. We may use your e-mail address to send you the newsletter and offers that may interest you, on behalf of Rolling Stone and its partners. For more information please read our Privacy Policy How we use your email address Trending Ranked on a scale from 1 to 10, the trending score reflects the number of users reading a story in real time. What is this? Philip French's classic DVD: Thelma & Louise | Film | The Guardian Philip French's classic DVD (Ridley Scott, 1991, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, 15) Great poise: Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis in Thelma & Louise.

Photograph: Rex Features Saturday 25 February 2012 19.05 EST First published on Saturday 25 February 2012 19.05 EST Share on Messenger Close Ridley Scott's masterly road movie was a feminist thriller in the Cormanesque exploitation style but with a much bigger budget and greater poise. Ditzy, put-upon lower-middle-class housewife Thelma (Geena Davis) and her chum, tough cafe waitress Louise (Susan Sarandon), take off from their Arkansas small town in Louise's 1966 Thunderbird for a weekend's fishing. But when Louise kills Thelma's would-be rapist they go on the run, heading for Mexico. To a possible murder charge they add armed robbery, kidnapping a policeman and massive destruction of property. The only decent man around is a sympathetic cop played by Harvey Keitel. It's a film that appeals to the outlaw in all of us, and ends with a freeze-frame reminiscent of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Pursuing a recurrent theme in his work (dutiful citizens rebelling against the conventional values in which they've been raised), Scott's movie stands alongside Alien and Blade Runner.

Strong supporting performances come from rising stars Brad Pitt and Michael Madsen. Callie Khouri won an Oscar for her original screenplay, her only work of note to date. Woody Harrelson confirms his reputation as one of the best actors at work today in this compelling James Ellroy-scripted thriller, writes Philip French Published: 25 Feb 2012 A cast of seasoned veterans of the stage head to the subcontinent for this pleasing if patronising rom-sitcom, writes Philip French Published: 25 Feb 2012 Otto Preminger's 1944 murder mystery is a noir classic, writes Philip French Published: 25 Feb 2012 Expect tears and laughter from this Australian canine smash hit, writes Philip French Published: 25 Feb 2012 Susan Sarandon: ‘Thelma & Louise’ almost had a different ending – EW.com Pinterest Roland Neveu The ending to Ridley Scott’s Thelma & Louise has become an enduring classic — and a very brave choice: faced with incarceration after going on the run, the film’s title characters drive off a cliff (“keep on going”) and into the Grand Canyon, falling to their deaths.

But in an alternate reality, it all could have been different. “When I met with Ridley, I said, ‘So really, are you going to… don’t have me do this and then when you test it and everybody gets bummed out, you’re going to reshoot and we’re going to be alive after all,'” star Susan Sarandon, who played Louise in the film, told EW during our Thelma & Louise reunion. “And he said, ‘Well, I can tell you that you will definitely die, but I’m not sure about the other one.'” Scott was referring to Geena Davis’ Thelma. “He said, ‘You might push her out of the car or something,'” Sarandon recalled. Fortunately, that didn’t happen, and the ending remained true to Callie Khouri’s script. “I think by then we had earned that ending,” Sarandon said of the scene, which wound up being the last both actresses shot during production. “It was very emotional for me, and maybe us. It was the last scene of the movie, we had 20 minutes to get it, and we’re going to say goodbye to each other. And so, meta!” Davis said of the experience shooting the finale.

“I turned and looked at her, I realized the whole experience was over, and I felt really sad.” For more from the stars on the film’s ending, 25 years later, watch above. And check out more from EW’s reunion below. To get the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly, on newsstands Friday, buy it here — and subscribe now for more exclusive interviews and photos, only in EW. Show Full Article

Question: Who played Thelma in the movie Thelma and Louise?
Answer: Gina Davis