Top Movies Of The 1990's: #12 Jackie Brown

Box Office: $39.7 Million Dollars

Oscar Nominations: Best Supporting Actor (Robert Forster)

Oscar Wins: None

MovieRankings.Net: 90/100

Available To Stream: Amazon Prime ($4)

It took years for Jackie Brown to get itself out of the giant Pulp Fiction shadow that swallowed it up. Anyone who liked movies was eagerly waiting to see how Quentin Tarantino would follow up his movie that not only changed Hollywood but was also wildly entertaining. When Jackie Brown came out three years later, it had expectations that no movie could live up to.

It never finished in the Top 4 of any weekend it was in movie theaters (the Nathan Lane comedy Mousehunt in its second week in release beat Jackie Brown in its opening weekend). The general reaction of people who did see the movie found it pretty boring.

Everyone was wrong. The audiences at the time. The Oscars (Tarentino didn't even get nominated for best screenplay yet the wildly overrated Wag The Dog did). The critics (except Roger Ebert who always loved this). 

Jackie Brown isn't just the perfect follow up to Pulp Fiction, I can understand why someone would say it's a better film.

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What was perceived as its biggest flaw is actually Jackie Brown's greatest strength: the quietness. Don't get me wrong. It's a movie with some wild characters, double crosses and cold blooded murders. But it's also a movie that allows these characters to breathe. Jackie Brown is still Tarentino's most mature movie. It's a movie that tells so much about what it means to be middle-aged and it was written and directed by a 34 year old.

Max Cherry is one of my favorite movie characters ever. I talk about him in this blog here.

This is a movie with many characters but it is ultimately about two people who take a similar risk for different reasons. Jackie is uncomfortable with aging and her future. Max seems content with his finances but is a lonely man who realizes it the second he sees Jackie for the first time. Max is brave and also smart enough to know he is being used. He's also calculated and knows himself well enough to be content with that.

I love how quietly Forster plays Max. There's a familiarity with the type of character Max is or how Forster is acting. In one scene, Max goes to the movies by himself at the mall and says he does it every week. Just his body movement walking out of the theater seems so realistic. Max Cherry is confident guy but is also very lonely and he is able to make that work and then show Max feeling the exact opposite way whenever he's around Jackie.

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There are so many fantastic characters to talk about in this movie. Michael Keaton's Ray Nicolette and Bridget Fonda's Melanie are perfectly overly enthusiastic and/or selfishly stupid. But it's Robert De Niro and Samuel L. Jackson that both really stand out for me. De Niro's Louis (or as Melanie says Lou-isssssssssss) is so believable as this idiot who just got off jail. Jackson's Ordell might be one of the scariest bad guys on film this decade. He seems capable of anything and no actor can speak Tarentino dialogue better than Jackson.

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I have been saving Pam Grier for last here as Jackie Brown. You have to buy that she would both be scared shitless of Ordell but also brave enough to risk screwing him over for $500,000. Not many actresses could have pulled that off. I don't know if Grier is a great actress but she's great here. She flirty with Max Cherry to get what she wants but also respects him a great deal. She can see how she's used being flirtatious to get what she wants for decades but it's the respect for a man that is newer for her. She's spent so much time around scumbags that trusting someone truly is something that's exciting but also scary for her.

The best thing about Jackie Brown is those quiet moments like Max Cherry and Jackie Brown talking about aging. Max is so much more comfortable with it. It's easier for guys. Jackie knows using her sexuality to get ahead might be something she can't do forever. But, where Max and Jackie's bodies get older, they also are much wiser than they were before. It's that wisdom and trust that win in the end.

This is the Tarentino movie where the characters feel the most realistic and lived in. I love (almost all) Tarantino movies. This isn't my absolute favorite but there is no Tarantino movie where I care more about the people I'm watching.

12. Jackie Brown

13. A Few Good Men

14. The Fugitive

15. The Truman Show

16. Fargo

17. Swingers

18. Reservoir Dogs

19. There's Something About Mary

20. Sleepers

21. Schindler's List

22. Rushmore

23. Fight Club

24. Saving Private Ryan

25. True Romance

26. Dumb & Dumber

27. Kingpin

28. Donnie Brasco

29. Heat 

30. Terminator 2: Judgement Day

31. Rounders

32. Unforgiven

33. Trainspotting

34. The Game

35. Out Of Sight

36. Carlito's Way

37. Seven

38. L.A. Confidential

39. Speed

40. Gattaca

41. Misery

42. Tombstone

43. Ransom

44. Wayne's World

45. The Insider

46. Back To The Future Part III

47. A Bronx Tale

48. The People Vs. Larry Flynt

49. Eyes Wide Shut

50. The Sandlot

51. Happy Gilmore

52. Contact

53. The Green Mile

54. Man On The Moon

55. Boyz N The Hood

56. Grosse Pointe Blank

57. Independence Day

58. The Rainmaker

59. Go

60. The Firm

61. Magnolia

62. The Talented Mr. Ripley

63. Tommy Boy

64. The Usual Suspects

65. In The Line Of Fire

66. My Cousin Vinny

67. Awakenings

68. JFK

69. Toy Story

70. Home Alone

71. Jerry Maguire

72. Titanic

73. Billy Madison

74. Apollo 13

75. Braveheart

76. Edward Scissorhands

77. Cape Fear

78. The River Wild

79. What's Eating Gilbert Grape?

80. 12 Monkeys

81. Stir Of Echoes

82. Mission: Impossible

83. Total Recall

84. Quiz Show

85. For Love Of The Game

86. Being John Malkovich

87. Men In Black

88. Scream

89. Alive

90. Three Kings

91. Glengarry Glen Ross

92. Die Hard With A Vengeance

93. The Blair Witch Project

94. Twister

95. Dirty Work

96. Election

97. Tremors

98. Any Given Sunday

99. The Wedding Singer

100. Clerk