THELMA AND LOUISE

Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon play Thelma and Louise, two working-class friends who together have planned a weekend getaway from the men in their lives. Thelma’s husband, Darryl (Chris McDonald), is an overbearing oaf, and Louise’s boyfriend, Jimmy (Michael Madsen), simply will not commit. Though the road trip starts out as a good time, the pair eventually wind up at a bar. A tipsy Thelma ends up in the parking lot of the bar with a would-be rapist. Louise shoots the man dead. The two decide that they have no choice but to go on the run. They eventually meet up with a young criminal named J.D. (Brad Pitt), whose cowboy spirit rubs off on the timid Thelma. The pair is pursued by a police officer (Harvey Keitel) sympathetic toward their plight. He chases them to the Grand Canyon, where the women make a fateful decision about their lives.

CHICAGO

A starry-eyed would-be star discovers just how far the notion that “there’s no such thing as bad publicity” can go in this screen adaptation of the hit Broadway musical CHICAGO, originally directed and choreographed by Bob Fosse. In the mid-’20s, Roxie Hart (Renee Zellweger) is a small-time chorus dancer married to a well-meaning dunderhead named Amos (John C. Reilly). Roxie is having an affair on the side with Fred Casley (Dominic West), a smooth talker who insists he can make her a star. However, Fred strings Roxie along a bit too far for his own good, and when she realizes that his promises are empty, she becomes enraged and murders Fred in cold blood. Roxie soon finds herself behind bars alongside Velma Kelly (Catherine Zeta-Jones), a sexy vaudeville star who used to perform with her sister until Velma discovered that her sister had been sleeping with her husband. Velma shot them both dead, and, after scheming prison matron “Mama” Morton hooks Velma up with hotshot lawyer Billy Flynn (Richard Gere), Velma becomes the new Queen of the scandal sheets. Roxie is just shrewd enough to realize that her poor fortune could also bring her fame, so she convinces Amos to also hire Flynn. Soon Flynn is splashing Roxie’s story — or, more accurately, a highly melodramatic revision of Roxie’s story — all over the gutter press, and Roxy and Velma are soon battling neck-to-neck over who can win greater fame through the headlines.