Released in 1997, Jackie Brown stars Samuel L. Jackson, Pam Grier, Robert Forster, Robert De Niro, Bridgett Fonda and Michael Keaton. Based on the novel Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard, the movie pays homage to 1970s Blaxsploitation films, though the film itself is not one of these. It involves a middle aged airline stewardess who smuggles money in from Mexico for a gun runner. It has everything Tarantino has become famous for. Intelligent dialogue, an intricate storyline, and some of cinemas most memorable and original characters.
The film opens with Jackie Brown (Grier), a flight attendant for a small Mexican airline. In order to make enough money to get by, she smuggles illicit cash on her routine flights for a Compton gun runner named Ordell Robbi (Jackson). Ordell lives in his house with Melanie (Fonda), and Louis (De Niro), a former cellmate who has recently been released from prison. Ordell's activities are being monitored by the ATF, who apprehend Jackie after she arrives in the USA with some of Ordell's money, and a bag of cocaine she was unaware was in her handbag.
Worried that Jackie may snitch on him to avoid jail time (as a previous employee had done), Ordell bails her out with the help of Bondsman Max Cherry (Forster), whom Jackie becomes close to as the film progresses. Ordell plans to kill Jackie, but instead she comes up with a plan to get $500,000 of his money, enough for him to retire, while also pretending to help the ATP agents apprehend him. One of the agents, Ray (Keaton) formulates a plan with Jackie to put Ordell and his money together, completely unaware that Jackie has made her own plans for the cash.
From there, the movie unfolds into one of the smartest crime movies in history. You are kept guessing up to the very end. The movie's tagline is 'Who's playing who'. You never know which way it's going to go. Will the money go to the agents, to Jackie, to Ordell? Even when they are doing a trial run of the hand-off you can't be sure what is occurring. On top of that, you have performances that revitalized the acting careers of both Pam Grier and Robert Forster, and garnered 2 BAFTA nominations, 1 for Grier, and 1 for Jackson.
The movie contains some of my favourite Tarantino scenes, such as where Jackson and De Niro are watching 'Chicks With Guns', and where Jackson is convincing one of his soon-to-be victims to climb into the boot of his car. In all honesty, I prefer Pulp Fiction to Jackie Brown, mainly because of the characters and the story lines, but I still love this movie. It holds up in pretty much every area. I loved it when I first saw, and I still love it years later.
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