ls Get the Blues, Sissy Hankshaw is ostracized for being different and takes to the road to take advantage of her naturally enormous thumbs. She hits the road but winds up a model of feminist leadership in the West on a ranch of lesbians. This film experiments with female role expansion more than the others, and it turns gender stereotypes on their head. As the Countess tells Sissy, “All of us are freaks in one way or another. Try being born a male Russian Countess into a white, middle class, Baptist family in Mississippi, and you’ll see what I mean.” In Boys on the Side, Jane, Robin, and Holly take to the road and experience bonding relationships on their 3,000 mile journey. They hit the road but find out it hits back, hard. Robin will die of AIDs, Holly will get married, and Jane will continue with her dreams on the road to California. Through loss, love, and humor the women bond as they try to discover a place to fit in where their identities are fulfilled. As Jane says in one line meant to poke holes in gender stereotypes, “She’s holding you back, man. Everyone says so. She’s like Yoko with bangs.”
The women in all of these films are basically hitting the road to expand their opportunities and self-expression in a world where women are either viewed as sex objects or property by the men around them. The roles played by the women in these films allow for a much different expression of character and freedom than the typical female in Hollywood road films and other genres. For example, in Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie is a luring, sexually aggressive female – a Circe to Clyde’s Odysseus if you will. In other road films like Lost In America, the female is a shy, introverted female who turns into a wildcat gambler because of the influence of her husband. With these two examples we have the classic gender stereotypes of women that traditionally have appeared in Hollywood films, stereotypes that are smashed ...