Thelma and Louise Essay
At the start of the
film Thelma is shown to be a typical housewife who bows down to her Husband.
You can see she takes the stereo typical 1990’s women who only job is to serve
the family you can see this in the opening scene when she is making Darryl (her
husband) a cup of tea and calling for him, as she says he’s going to be late.
It shows that most of what she does is to please Darryl and even though she
looks after him, he controls her like he’s more important. This makes him look incapable
of doing things by himself and that she looks after him. She is portrayed to be
a girly girl as for her clothing in the film she wears very feminine clothes,
for example she wears a white frilly top which can come resembles innocent
which she portrays at the start of the film. However Louise is shown to be the
less feminine one as she wears trousers and a top with her hair up. She also
comes across as the wiser and smarter one as she packs as little as possible however
Thelma packs most of her wardrobe and you also see her put a lamp in the car
which make she looks quite gullible but this makes her more loveable to the
audience as you find it funny.
Out of the pair
Louise is straight away seen holding the most power and Thelma will do anything
that Louise asks of her. Louise is also seen as the most mature and the
‘parent’ in their friendship. You can see that Louise is more sensible than
Thelma when they arrive at the bar as Thelma attracts Harlan (man at the bar)
and starts to flirt with him without even realising which just shows how naive
she is. However Louise automatically becomes protective over her and tells him
where to go but both Thelma and Harlan ignore her. When Louise goes to the
toilet, Harlan takes the chance to take Thelma outside and tries to seduce her.
However when Thelma refuses he forces himself on her which shows men were more
powerful back then and got their way. It also shows that Thelma is weak and is
easily taken advantage of. Harlan would also of gotten away with it and people
would say that she brought it on herself and was leading him on, so she’d only
have herself to blame. However Louise comes out and threatens him with the gun
showing that she isn’t scared of a man which shows that she is brave. This
shocks the audience as it goes again the ‘typical women’ back then as she shows
that she isn’t scared and helpless like Thelma was. She first tells Harlan to
go but he becomes arrogant and aggressive which Louise gets aggravated by and
shoots him. Both Louise and Thelma run off and drive away from the bar. Thelma
then decides as they are driving to brush her hair and do her make up like
that’s the most important thing at this point, even though Louise has just shot
and killed a man.
Thelma starts to show
her more reckless side when she sleeps with J.D, even though she is married. At
this point Louise meets up with her fellow lover Jimmy, where you see the more
softer and emotional side to her and all the sudden you see that her strong,
independent women is almost a front. After the money is stolen by J.D it’s like
Thelma’s head is screwed on and becomes more independent and knows that she
must do things by herself and basically needs to man up. This is shown she goes
into the shop and pulls out the gun and makes everyone get on the ground. In
this situation she has the most power and control but you still know that she
still isn’t a threatening or violent person. She takes the money from the till
and then shouts at Louise 5to drive showing that she is now telling Louise what
to do and almost swapping roles and has taking the responsibility to provide
them with money no matter what. Later on in the film Thelma and Louise get
pulled over by a cop and asks Louise to exit the vehicle and come into the cop
car with him. When you think that Louise is done for Thelma goes up to the
officer and puts the gun to the head and tells him to put his hands on the
wheel. She then tells Louise to take the gun and proceed to put the officer in
the boot. Louise is seen to be the more gullible one as when Thelma tells her
to shoot the radio she shoots the music radio and not the police radio. When
they get back in the car Louise and Thelma swap places and Thelma is in the
driver’s seat. This shows that Thelma has more power as she’s taking control of
the situation.
Next the girls are driving along the road and
a truck driver indicates for them to pull over and they just ignore him.
However after seeing him for a second time they tell him to pull over but what
happens next isn’t what he was expecting. They humiliate and be little him to
show that they are stronger than him and won’t be treated like dirt just
because there seen as the weaker ones because there the opposite sex. He
doesn’t react very well causing him to be verbally rude so to show that he can’t
talk to him like that both of them take out a gun and shoot his truck causing
it to explode and go up in flames. Both Louise and Thelma drive off with
adrenaline and laughter. Showing that they are carless of what they have just
done, this was basically committing a crime.
Overall the film
shows that throughout the film both Louise and Thelma become more independent
and drift away from the stereo typical woman. Thelma becomes more of an
individual and is no longer controlled by her husband at the end of the film.
They represent the powerful and independent women that don’t need a man to
protect them and can look after themselves.
