Samuel L. Jackson - Ordell Robbie
Robert Forster - Max Cherry
Robert De Niro - Louis Gara
Bridget Fonda - Melanie Ralston
Michael Keaton - Ray Nicolette
Quentin Tarantino (Director)
I remember the first time I saw Jackie Brown like it was yesterday. I was a cold Midwestern night and I was a cinematic neophyte. It was QT's prior film Pulp Fiction that turned me on to the art of film making and made me realize that the medium of film could be more than simple entertainment. This was the most excited I had ever been to see a movie. After seeing Pulp I began absorbing everything movie through a Tarantino filter. I went back and watched his first film Reservoir Dogs. I watched Four Rooms. I watched True Romance and Natural Born Killers. All of which he wrote, directed or both. All of which had movie references littered throughout. I watched all the movies referenced. I watched the other films made by these directors. I studied Tarantino and watched he friends films, I watched his favorite films. I watched just about everything I could get my hands on that had anything at all to do with QT.
I remember standing in line to see Jackie Brown with a smile on my face so big and so pronounced that I can still remember the mussels in my face hurting. I finally took my seat and there it started. An opening that was a direct homage to The Graduate. Pam Grier on a people mover at the airport. Across 110th Street was blasting through the speakers (a 1970's blaxploitation reference). I was in film geek heaven.
Jackie Brown was based on the book Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard, an author who I have actually read some of his books. It is the story of a down-on-her-luck flight attendant who is smuggling money in the country for a small time arms dealer. When the DEA busts her, she acquires the help of her bail bondsman and then sets out to fool them all and make out like a bandit. If you have ever read any Leonard then you would know that my description matches most of his work. I is kind of like saying the Coen Brother movie where the guy finds some money and get into a situation that he can't get out of.
But with Jackie Brown you have all the QT touches. You get an awesome soundtrack, titillating banter, camera work like you won't find anywhere else, perfect close-up's, performances that will blow your mind and so on and so on.
Watching Jackie Brown again it was the performances that struck me the most. I watched this with a friend and I was stunned at how good everyone in it is. They all know exactly what they are supposed to be doing. I give a lot of credit to the actors of course, but QT gets a fair amount of props as well. Pam Grier is perfect. If you casted this film every 10 years for the next 1,000 years you would never get a better performance. First off there is her natural beauty, then she brings A TON to this role. Being a former star then getting left behind as did so many of the black actors of the 70's, she had a bruised ego that you can't "act". It is either there or it isn't and the only way to get it is to have been on top and then hit rock bottom and stay there for a long while. QT has a line in Death Proof "There is little more fetching than an angle with a bruised ego."
Then you get to Robert Forster (the bail bondsman). Once upon a time he had been a big time character actor in quite a few movies that cinephiles geek out on. Until Jackie Brown he had been doing work on TV shows like Walker Texas Ranger and Murder She wrote. QT really went out on a limb by hiring actors that Hollywood were past their prime (Grier, Forster, even Keaton). Forster is amazing as Max Cherry. He never seems too big nor too small for the role. I commented to my friend on just how natural he was.
Of course Sam Jackson knocked a role that might as well have been written for him right out of the park. De Niro seemed a little out of place as the goof ball ex-con, but his scenes with Bridget Fonda were pretty good. There are a few notable other bit roles, but in the consideration of time I will bypass them.
One thing I love about QT's movies is that you don't have to know all the movie references to appreciate his films. He gets criticized a lot for not being original enough, or being too dirivitive. His detractors say that anyone can take segments of their favorite films and make a movie. I say "then do it". Why aren't people doing it? The reason is that it is not that easy. Many have tried. Once Pulp hit there was a surge of copycat films (2 Days in the Valley) that tried to do what QT does and they couldn't. The thing about his films is that if you can catch that Sid Haig, who plays the judge in Jackie Brown, was also a bad guy in the movie Foxy Brown with Pam Grier in 1974 then you receive a bonus. But if not, there is no detriment to the viewer. He doesn't punish the common viewer for not having a cinematic roladex like he has.
Many people refer to Jackie Brown as QT's "grown-up" film. I think that this is in response to the change of pace and style (sort of) from Pulp. Jackie Brown is far more of a character study then any of his other films. I think people associate that with maturity. I feel like QT came to maturity with Pulp. Dogs was his adolescence and everything after has been a grown man making grown film. I place Jackie Brown in the bottom half of QT's films, but that is not a knock. He hasn't made a film that I don't absolutely love. I give Jackie Brown ★★★★1/2. Check out the Trailer Park to see for yourself.
