On Mon, 4 Sep 1995, DAVID MOON wrote:

 

>

>       Mistress fate was certainly on their side against

>      incredible odds right up to the end and happily made their final flight

>      into the next world (Butch Cassidy style) an honourable one.

>

 

It seems to me that David Moon makes an interesting observation in noting

the *Butch Cassidy* nature of the ending.  There is a

very telling contrast between these two endings.  The Butch Cassidy

ending is consistent with the western-macho genre.  The *heros* move out

TOWARD the source of violence and death (other males), their phallic

symbols ready to shoot.  Freeze frame and we hear the infinite shots of

orgasmic gunfire.

 

In T&L, the women make their final moves AWAY from the source of violence

(males) but toward death (while a male is chasing after them).  This is a

female ending, but it is hardly a liberating one.  Its iconography

belongs to a film tradition which goes back to the early silent era, when

the fair damsel, pursued by a rapacious male (often with a racist

subtext), rather than submit, jumps off the cliff or into the raging river.

Liberation through death is an old theme, but it is hardly liberation in

the sense I understand feminism.  Whether or not the fact that two women

go off a cliff together (in buddy movie fashion) makes a differnce as a

text, one which can be read as *liberation* and *freedom,* seems doubtful.

 

Ron Hoffman

 

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