WHY JACKIE BROWN IS THIS PROGRAMMER’S PERSONAL FAVORITE TARANTINO by Craig Hammill

To say that this Programmer has had a conflicted relationship with Quentin Tarantino’s body of work would be an understatement.

On one hand, every Tarantino movie is an exciting event and ALL of his movies have delivered on some and on occasion ALL levels.  His love of cinema is monumental and inspiring. His commitment to bat for the fences EACH and EVERY time he makes a movie is THE model most moviemakers should aspire to.

Beyond that, Quentin Tarantino just makes good movies. Period. Full stop. And his evident sharp intelligence in understanding how to guide his career may be one of the best the movie industry has ever seen.

On the other hand, this Programmer occasionally wonders if maybe Tarantino’s movies are TOO MUCH about movies. Too self-aware.

Yet all this being acknowledged as a means of full (or too much) disclosure, there are three Tarantinos this Programmer loves and thinks are truly great: Reservoir Dogs, Jackie Brown, and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood.

And after having seen them all again this past month, it is Jackie Brown which still feels like the quiet but sturdy masterpiece that rises above all others.

Let’s just acknowledge: other Tarantinos may have better scenes.  You’d be hard pressed to top the Christoph Waltz or Michael Fassbender in the basement bar scenes of Inglorious Basterds or the extended dinner table scene of Django Unchained.  Other Tarantinos are MORE BOLDLY cinematic.  Jackie Brown paints in subdued desaturated color schemes whereas Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, Death Proof paint in bold, striking colors.

And Once Upon A Time In Hollywood definitely marries the bold and contemplative sides of Tarantino the best of any of his movies.

Yet Jackie Brown lives and breathes in a world that feels real (rather than a world that could only exist as an extension of movies), achieves emotional resonances and truths that only deepen with age, and is still chock full of hilarious, fascinating, great sequences. It is, for those open to it, an embarrassment of riches.

Jackie Brown may, in a weird way, be Tarantino’s The Big Lebowski. Here defined as a movie that gets better each time one views it until by the third or fourth viewing, one realizes it may be one of the greatest movies of the last 20-30 years.

Jackie Brown, adapted from the Elmore Leonard novel Rum Punch, tells the story of down on her luck airline stewardess Jackie Brown (played in a career best turn with unquestionable authority by 1970’s blacksploitation and exploitation queen Pam Grier) who gets caught by ATF agents smuggling cash and cocaine into Los Angeles. The gun runner she works for, Ordell Robie (played to perfection by Sam Jackson who has stated this is his favorite Tarantino role), plans to kill her for getting caught until Jackie, to survive, pitches him an idea on how to get all his money into the states right under the noses of the ATF. 

The movie quickly becomes a “Who’s playing who” ensemble piece as we get introduced to Michael Keaton’s hyper masculine ATF agent, Ray Nicollette, Ordell’s stoner ex-convict partner Louis (played hilariously in a great undersung character turn by Robert De Niro), Ordell’s bitter kept surfer girl Melanie (a simultaneously endearing and bitchy Bridget Fonda). In fact the only person we’re pretty sure is on the level, sincere, and a straight shooter is bail bondsman Max Cherry (Robert Forster in the role that single handedly re-jump started his career, something of a Tarantino specialty) who is smitten with Jackie when he picks her up from jail and just wants to help her from that point forward

The movie is a middle aged romance on a whole host of levels. It’s a love letter to Tarantino’s hometown South Bay part of Los Angeles. It’s a romance between two middle aged people who are played by two middle aged actors who know the ups and downs of a long term acting career. It’s a romance between a great writer (Tarantino) who gets to adapt another great writer (Leonard).

The paradox or irony here may be that Tarantino, coming off Pulp Fiction as writer/director and an intense period of being the pop culture auteur who influenced dozens of Pulp Fiction rip offs in the mid-90’s, has stated that he did Jackie Brown more to make something as a professional director. The intimation being that, because he adapted it, he didn’t necessarily feel as passionately about the material or work as he had (or would again) with his wholly original scripts.

But by adapting another writer’s work, Tarantino may have surprisingly elevated his game. Many of our greatest directors have done this. Kubrick based all his movies on pre-existing novels starting early on with his third movie The Killing. From that point forward, no Kubrick movie would be an original idea or written without collaboration from other great writers. Kurosawa made it a point to ALWAYS write his scripts with one or two other co-writers to check his own short comings or blind spots.  Fellini did much the same. Tarantino, by adapting Leonard, actually feels much more disciplined and to the point in Jackie Brown. Every scene feels necessary.  Every scene sings. 

And where to begin with all the great scenes in this movie? Ordell’s late night visit to another newly bailed out underling Beaumont (played hilariously in a one scene home run by Chris Tucker) is a masterclass in how comedy can quickly turn to malevolence.

Jackie’s and Max’s early morning talk about what it’s like to be middle aged in her apartment over coffee illuminates such an illusive truth, it’s nothing short of a miracle. 

De Niro’s many stoned Louis scenes add endearing and hilarious comedic grace notes throughout. 

Even Michael Keaton’s more straight ahead yet “don’t underestimate this guy” performance as Ray reveals itself, upon repeated viewings, to be much more layered than at first meet the eye (he pitches it somewhere between keenly observant and obtusely self-involved). 

And the whole movie builds to a final “will they or won’t they” scene between Jackie and Max that may, in its own way, approach the profundity of Casablanca’’s final scene.

Am I waxing a bit too rhapsodic? Yeah. Am I overselling this movie? I hope not.

Because Jackie Brown is a treasure that deserves to be discovered. Not a treasure like a chest of gleaming glittering priceless jewels that may bring as much danger as wealth.  But a treasure like a reasonably priced homey local restaurant that comes to be, after years of attendance, the repository of a lifetime of meaningful personal interaction.  By which I mean something TRULY VALUABLE TO THE SOUL.

Or maybe put another way, others may have their favorite Tarantino movies. And I respect the hell out of that. But Jackie Brown is the most personally meaningful Tarantino to me.

Craig Hammill is the founder.programmer of Secret Movie Club.