Embodiment of Thelma and Louise
Within the road film genre, as a part of the modern cinematic culture, phallocentrism and masculinist narratives have dominated, however, in recent years, the feminist road film has been emerging to subvert traditional elements of the classical road film. One of these films is Ridley Scott’s 1991 road film thriller, Thelma and Louise. Thelma and Louise proves as an effective feminist critique in whole with its counter cinema techniques of filmmaking, but one thematic specifically that the film works against is the viewpoint of the camera centering around the male gaze. One scene in particular that not only works against the male gaze, but also formulates a female gaze, is the encountering of the character J.D, played by Brad Pitt. Within the scenes involving J.D., not only do the women of the film take back the gaze normally put upon women within traditional road films, such as Easy Rider, where women are objects for sexual objectification, but the women, specifically Thelma (Gena Davis) create a female gaze of their own. Having the viewpoint of the camera center on J.D., and take the perspective of the women of the film, J.D. becomes eroticized instead of the women; a female gaze emerges, which proves as an effective feminist element of the film.
Although there are various definitions of ‘feminism,’ for myself feminism, in whole, means the collaboration of theories and beliefs that center around the equality of men and women, and Thelma and Louise proves as an affirmative embodiment of that within the road film genre.