Tampa Bay Times from St. Petersburg, Florida • 85

ON SCREEN MOVIES mum wrra HOASTO mas a It's a female version of the old road movies. Men, watch your images. 1 A I if MOVIE REVIEW Thelma Louise Director: Ridley Scott Cast Susan Sarandon, Geena Davis, Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Christopher McDonald, Stephen Tobolowsky, Brad Pitt Screenplay: Callie Khouri Rating: violence, profanity, sexual situations Running time: 129 minutes 7-n M'l hp- Thelma escapes. Then Louise, seething wittu. indignation, shoots him after a nasty exchange of words.

So begins a Mexico-bound odyssey that unwittingly turns the women into convenience-store robbers while teaching them the meaning of sisterhood. Thelma Louiseis a feminist buddy movie, a Hollywood rarity in which women take charge of their destiny. It's a movie men can watch and laugh at the caricatures of themselves. Perhaps the most glaring shortcoming is that men get the stereotypical treatment normally accorded women. Darryl is a bossy lout; Jimmy is utterly directionless; and J.D.

(Brad Pitt), the hitchhiker Thelma befriends because she likes the wiggle of his walk, is sweet-talking poison. Only Hal (Harvey Keitel), the Arkansas state cop investigating the murder, treats the fugitives like humans instead of prey on the lam. Scott, an action director whose Alien, Blade Runner and Black Rain have demonstrated technical prowess but little sensitivity toward women, proves adept at delivering Thelma Louise's wry humor and its political bite. Like all his films, Thelma Louise is stunning, its red sandstone vistas bursting By HAL UPPER Times Film Critic On its most basic level, Thelma Louiseis a gender-bender road movie. Rather than Bing and Bob, or Burt and Dom, it's Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis chasing their fate along America's byways.

Only Thelma Louise elevates the genre to uncharted heights. It's Easy Rider, The Vanishing Point and The Sugarland Express with a feminist twist. It's a smart, funny, heartfelt tale exploring the status of lower-middle-class women in backwater America. At the same time, it's a crisply written allegory about taking control of your life. Screenwriter Callie Khouri and director Ridley Scott occasionally dawdle too long in Dogpatch locales, simultaneously celebrating and ridiculing the colorful simplicity of poor-white-trash existence.

Yet, overall, their movie buoyantly explores working-class life and the inequality accorded the genders. Louise Sawyer (Sarandon) and Thelma Dickinson (Davis) are lifelong friends. Louise works in an Arkansas coffee shop and has a musician boyfriend, Jimmy (Michael Mad-sen), who's paralyzed by the thought of commitment. Thelma is married to her high school sweetheart, Darryl (Christopher McDonald), a carpet salesman who hardly is sweet, expecting servitude on Thelma's part. Louise is a firebrand, and Thelma can't even muster the courage to ask Darryl whether she can go fishing with Louise for the weekend.

She simply leaves a note and dinner in the microwave when she and Louise hit the asphalt in Louise's '66 T-bird convertible. As with most road movies, the highway is an avenue to liberation and a path to nowhere. Louise escapes the bustle of the coffee shop; Thelma escapes Darryl. But neither gets where she originally intended to go. Liberation takes a dark turn at nightfall when the women swing into a rural honky-tonk and Thelma is courted by a cowpoke Romeo (Timothy Carhart).

After a few drinks and dances, the cowboy follows Thelma to the parking lot and attempts to rape her. Louise appears with a loaded revolver. Path Entertainment ROAD TRIP: Susan Sarandon, left, and Geena Davis, travel partners. like monoliths against the turquoise sky. The sound track, with cuts by artists as diverse as Glenn Frey, Kelly Willis, B.B.

King, Marianne Martha Reeves and Hans Zimmer, shifts style and tone to match the story's situations and mood of its cast. Sarandon is even better than in Bull Durham, in part, because her character's strength is continually shifting. She begins as the movie's dominant force but relinquishes control as Thelma grows. She is radiant and justifiably bitter. Davis eclipses her Oscar-winning performance in The Accidental Tourist.

During the course of four short days, she grows into a fully actualized woman, exiiding a boundless zest for loving and life. She is radiant. Although Thelma Louise is as predictable as its testosterone-fueled predecessors, it has a boldness and boundlessness that make it a joy to watch. When Sarandon and Davis lock a too-tough-for-words state trooper in the trunk of his patrol car or when they blow up a trucker's rig for the flagrant display of his tongue, they send their tale to stratospheric heights. The harder they push, the better Thelma Louise becomes.

AT THE BOX OFFICE and tor complete run of filma nationwide. 6 Oscar, Disney Last week: 1,373 screens, $18.1 -million, four weeks. 7 The Silence of the Lambs, Orion Last week- 1,444 screens, 14 weeks. 8 Mannequin 2 On the Move, 20th Century Fox Last week 1,540 screens, one week. 9 A Kiss Before Dying, Universal Last week: 1,269 screens, four weeks.

Movie earning! compiled for moat recent IWhat About Disney Last week: 1,463 screens, one week. 2 2, Orion Last week: 1,502 screens, two weeks. 3 Truth or Dan, Miramax Last week: 538 screens, two weeks. 4 Switch, Warner Bros. Last week $3-million, 1,013 screens, two weeks.

5 Stone Cold, Columbia Last week 1,729 screens, one week. Good Food at Affordable Prices Early Birds 3-6 P.M. Open 7 Days 7 a.m.rl 1 p.m. 9701-lst Street East Corner of Gulf Blvd. Blind Pass Rd.

Treasure Island 367-3359 10 One Good Cop, Disney Last week: $1 1,327 screens, $9-million, three weeks. FRIDAY, MAY 24, 1991 TIMES.