The Film That Changed My Life: Thelma & Louise
Trapped, frustrated, bored to death. Not the tagline for ‘2020: The Movie’, but me at 14, riddled with the usual, cliched teenage ennui. Into this oh-so-familiar picture, came The Film That Changed My Life ™. Top down, buckle up and don’t you litter. We’re going on a road trip with Thelma & Louise.
Life at 14 was school, shopping centres, park, repeat. I didn’t know much, but one thing I’d been sure of since a very young age was that I didn’t want children. But everyone tells you you’ll change your mind, don’t they? I knew I wanted to travel as much as I could, keep my life open for adventures. The idea of settling in the suburbs as my mum had (and her mum before her) didn’t appeal. It was nice, but not for me. I was desperate to see more of the world. I’d never been abroad, I’d never been on a plane. I was ready. If only I was in possession of money, a car or any common sense.
I used all the resources I could to look out at the wider world, but alas, it was 1995 - no internet! No Netflix! There was Microsoft Encarta and we had a Blockbuster membership, but the tapes kept getting stuck in our machine and we had to prise them out with a spatula. The cinema was two buses away so I mostly watched whatever film was on TV whether I liked it or not. So when the perfect film popped up on BBC One at the perfect time, it was a significant event. It felt like my destiny.
The perfect time was 11.30pm, after my parents had gone to bed and I had sneaked a shot of my dad’s whiskey into a mug. As Hans Zimmer’s bluesy, moody score twanged onto the screen, the perfect film was about to be discovered.
In case you’ve missed it, Thelma and Louise are a housewife and a waitress respectively, who head off on a girls weekend to the mountains for some R&R. A stop at a bar and an encounter with a POS man leads to violence and our heroines flee to Mexico with the law in hot pursuit. I’ll avoid spoilers, but let’s just say their plans for a nice, scenic drive to the country for a weekend’s fishing, are swiftly replaced with kick-ass car chases, polite armed robbery and near constant liquor drinking.
As a female-led film, it caused a huge stir when it was released in 1991. Stars Geena Davis (35) and Susan Sarandon (44) were ancient by Hollywood standards. Additionally, there was much debate over whether the film was man-hating and a bad influence for women. Despite – or maybe because - of this Callie Khouri won an Oscar for her screenplay and a new age of female-driven cinema was confidently predicted. Any day now, right? Unfortunately, from 2007 to 2014, women made up only 30.2% of all speaking or named characters in the 100 top-grossing films in the US. Those seismic changes never came.
But for one girl in the ‘burbs (that’s me), T&L brought an awakening, and with it new found confidence, self-belief and hope. Maybe the film industry remained the same, but I’m sure I can’t be the only teenager of the time, the only woman, whose life was altered thanks to this amazing, trailblazing story.
T&L is a film about transgressing traditional feminine roles such as passive housewife, jaded waitress or, in my case, awkward teenage girl. One obvious way this is reflected is in our heroines’ appearance. The Polaroid they snap at the beginning shows them beautifully coiffed and made-up. The more they veer from the traditional path, becoming outlaws and defying authority, the more careless they become about their appearance. They’ve got bigger shit to worry about, after all. Louise throws her lipstick out the car and swaps her jewellery for a practical Stetson. Thelma dons double denim, a stolen baseball cap and musses her hair. Significantly, the Polaroid flies out the car at the end of the film, reminding us of what our heroines have rejected and how much they have changed.
For a teenage girl conscious of her developing body and accustomed to boys and patronising adults telling her to ‘look pretty’, T&L’s rejection of their assigned, decorative roles was thrilling. I vowed to be firmer with my mother on my refusal to wear pink.
Other choices made in the film also reject the traditional idea of what it is to be a woman. Thelma chooses adultery and the ‘call of the wild’, over her previous ‘respectable’ existence. Louise rejects a long-wished for proposal from boyfriend Jimmy (Michael Madsen). The distance – and difference – between them is now too great, and there’s no place for him in her new life.
Watching as a teenager, there were so many parallels between Thelma’s journey and my own bonds and restrictions. Thelma is frozen as a perpetual teenager (the age when she met her husband). She sneaks out, leaving him a note because she didn’t dare ‘ask his permission’ to go away. She looks up to Louise, imitating her friend by dangling a cigarette out of her mouth and acting cool (“Hey, I’m Louise”) and Louise frequently chides her gently in a motherly way.
By the end of the film it is Thelma who has changed the most, who takes care of her friend and who suggests the solution to their troubles. Some of the most significant (and humorous) moments in the film comes through Thelma’s discovery of herself and her capabilities, from giving a policeman a stark warning to treat his wife well (“My husband wasn’t sweet to me and look how I turned out”), to telling her controlling, cheating husband “Daryll, go fuck yourself!” Who didn’t want to say the same to authority figures, parents or to some smarmy, patronising teacher?
Shivers still go through me at Thelma’s declaration when reflecting on her old life: “Something’s crossed over in me and I can’t go back. I mean, I just couldn’t live”. At 14, those words were an ice cold shower, blasting away layers of bullshit. I realised that despite being told I was young and silly, I did know myself. I knew who I was and what I wanted. And someday, I too would be an adult woman, free to make her own choices. I would take Louise’s warning, “you get what you settle for”, and not let traditional ideas or older, authority figures tell me who I should be.
There are so many other things in this film that touched me, inspired me and make me happy even now. Eventually I did get to travel and even went on my very own road trip to the States. I saw the Goddamned Grand Canyon and amused my friends by getting over-excited at signs for Fresno (“That’s where the pervy truck driver was going!”). I bought a cowgirl hat and I drank whiskey. It felt great.
As I sit here reminiscing on T&L, I feel like 14 year old me once again. Except this time, it’s not youth that’s restricting what I can do, it’s this crazy, shitty year. The Coronacoaster has brought fear and uncertainty about the future. We’ve lost so many of the things – work, hobbies, time with family and friends – that define us. It’s taken me back to those days, to the girl who was so desperate to carve out her own path and define her future. Under these circumstances, Thelma & Louise reminds me of who I am and I hope it can remind you that life is still out there. Adventures and our new and not-yet-created stories lie ahead. We just can’t give up hope. In the wise words of Louise, “we'll be drinking margaritas by the sea, mamacita”. And we will soon. I promise.
Written by Mel Coghlan
Mel Coghlan is a an exams organiser, event co-ordinator, sometime tour guide and spreadsheet queen from London.
When not doing all of the above, she enjoys writing, theatre, wine drinking and anything that staves off anxiety. Mel finds talking about herself in the third person disconcerting, but oddly pleasing.