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Jackie Brown is a 1997 American crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, based on the 1992 novel Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard. It stars Pam Grier as Jackie Brown, a flight attendant who smuggles money between the United States and Mexico. Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster, Bridget Fonda, Michael Keaton and Robert De Niro appear in supporting roles.
Jackie Brown pays homage to 1970s blaxploitation films, particularly Coffy and Foxy Brown, both of which also starred Grier. It is the only feature-length film directed by Tarantino that was based on another work.
Jackie Brown was released in the United States on December 25, 1997, by Miramax Films. It received positive reviews and grossed $74.7 million worldwide on a $12 million budget. It was both Grier and Forster's first lead role in a major film for many years, and earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Forster, and Golden Globe Award nominations for Jackson and Grier.
Acting on information Beaumont had already given them, ATF agent Ray Nicolette and LAPD detective Mark Dargus intercept Jackie with Ordell's cash and a bag of cocaine. After Jackie is sent to jail, Ordell has Max pay her bail. Ordell arrives at Jackie's apartment, but she pulls out a gun she stole from Max's glovebox. She negotiates a deal with Ordell: she will pretend to help the authorities while smuggling in the remaining $550,000 of Ordell's money.
Ordell replaces Beaumont with Louis Gara, a criminal associate and former cellmate who has just been released from prison. Melanie Ralston, one of Ordell's mistresses, asks Louis to betray Ordell and take the money for themselves. Louis tells Ordell, but Ordell replies that he is not concerned about her, given that he knows that she is not to be trusted.
Unaware of the plan to smuggle in $550,000, Nicolette and Dargus devise a sting to catch Ordell during a transfer of $50,000. Jackie plans to keep the $500,000 for herself. She recruits Max, offering him a cut. During a test run, Jackie smuggles in $10,000, with Nicolette and Dargus aware, to swap with Sheronda, one of Ordell's girlfriends, at a shopping mall. After Jackie leaves, Max observes an unknown woman swap bags with Sheronda. He informs Jackie and she confronts Ordell, who reveals that he sent Simone Hawkins, another mule, to secure his money as a backup.
On the day of the transfer, Ordell discovers that Simone has left town with the $10,000. He reluctantly recruits Melanie to perform the swap instead. Jackie enters a dressing room in a department store to try on a suit. Although she has told Nicolette that the exchange will take place in the food court, she has told Ordell that she will swap bags in the dressing room. However, the bag contains only $40,000; Jackie leaves the rest in the dressing room for Max. Jackie takes $10,000 and places it on top of the bag that she gives to Melanie. Jackie runs to the food court and finds Nicolette, claiming that Melanie burst into the dressing room and stole the money.
During the exchange, Melanie is uncooperative. In the parking lot, after making fun of Louis for forgetting where they parked, Louis fatally shoots her. Louis tells Ordell, who discovers that most of the money is missing. When Louis recalls seeing Max at the shopping mall, an enraged Ordell kills Louis.
Ordell instructs Max to tell Jackie that Ordell will kill them if she does not return the money, and that if she goes to the police, he will name her as an accessory. Max goes to Ordell's house, and tells him that Jackie, frightened, is waiting in Max's office with the money. Ordell holds Max at gunpoint as they enter his office. Jackie yells that Ordell has a gun. Nicolette, Dargus and Cherry's business partner Winston, who provided Max with Ordell's location, hiding in the back, ambush him and shoot him dead. The charges against Jackie are dropped, and she plans a trip to Madrid. Max declines an invitation to join her. They kiss goodbye and he watches her drive away.
While adapting Rum Punch into a screenplay, Tarantino changed the ethnicity of the main character from white to Black, as well as renaming her from Burke to Brown, titling the screenplay Jackie Brown. Tarantino hesitated to discuss the changes with Leonard, finally speaking with Leonard as the film was about to start shooting. Leonard loved the screenplay, considering it the best of the twenty-six screen adaptations of his novels and short stories, and also stating that it was possibly the best screenplay he had ever read.
Tarantino's screenplay otherwise closely followed Leonard's novel, incorporating elements of Tarantino's trademark humor and pacing. The screenplay was also influenced by blaxploitation films, but Tarantino said Jackie Brown is not a blaxploitation film.
Jackie Brown alludes to Grier's career in many ways. The film's poster resembles those of Grier's films Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974) and includes quotes from both films. The typeface for the film's opening titles was also used for those of Foxy Brown; some of the background music is taken from these films, including four songs from Roy Ayers's original score for Coffy.
The film's opening sequence recreates that of The Graduate (1967), in which Dustin Hoffman passes wearily through Los Angeles International Airport past white tiles to a somber "The Sound of Silence" by Simon and Garfunkel. In Jackie Brown, Grier walks to a soaring soul music song, "Across 110th Street" by Bobby Womack, which is from the film Across 110th Street, from the blaxploitation genre, just like Foxy Brown and Coffy.
Grier did not expect Tarantino to contact her after the success of Pulp Fiction. When she showed up to read for Jackie Brown, Tarantino had posters of her films in his office. She asked if he had put them up because she was coming to read for his film, and he responded that he was actually planning to take them down before her audition, to avoid making it look like he wanted to impress her.
Several years after the release of the movie, Sylvester Stallone claimed that he turned down the role of Louis Gara. Tarantino considered Paul Newman, Gene Hackman and John Saxon for the role of Max Cherry, before casting Robert Forster.
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times rated the film four stars out of four, writing that "Tarantino leaves the hardest questions for last, hides his moves, conceals his strategies in plain view, and gives his characters dialogue that is alive, authentic and spontaneous". He also ranked the film as one of his favorites of 1997.
Movie critic Mark Kermode for BBC Radio Five Live lists Jackie Brown as his favorite film by Quentin Tarantino. Samuel L. Jackson, who appears frequently in Tarantino's films, named his character of Ordell Robbie as one of his favorite roles.
The filmmaker Spike Lee criticized the film's use of the word and said, "I'm not against the word, and I use it, but not excessively. And some people speak that way. But, Quentin is infatuated with that word. What does he want to be madean honorary black man? And he uses it in all his pictures: Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs... I want Quentin to know that all African-Americans do not think that word is trendy or slick." Lee took his concerns to the film's producers, Harvey Weinstein and Lawrence Bender.
The film critic Pascoe Soyurz said, "I wouldn't necessarily align myself with Spike Lee, but I do have some reservations about a film of this kind coming out at this time. It seems to me there's a kind of culture-vulture feel to it. I'm concerned about the whole 'blaxploitation' thing. Hollywood is a dream factory but it was Hollywood that created some of the most negative images of black people, which had major effects on the way we were perceived around the world." He concludes by stating that Tarantino's use of the word "devalues the word and the word has a lot of significance".
At the 48th Berlin International Film Festival, Jackson won the Silver Bear for Best Actor award.
| Best Actress | Pam Grier | |
| Best Supporting Actor | Robert Forster | |
| Best Film Editing | Sally Menke | |
| Honorable Mentions (The Next Ten Best Picture Contenders) | ||
| Silver Bear for Best Actor | Samuel L. Jackson | |
| Best Supporting Actor | Robert Forster | |
| Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy | Pam Grier | |
| Best Supporting Actor | Robert Forster | |
Songs by a variety of artists are heard throughout the film, including The Delfonics' "La-La Means I Love You" and "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)", Bill Withers's "Who Is He", The Grass Roots' "Midnight Confessions", Johnny Cash's "Tennessee Stud", Bloodstone's "Natural High", and Foxy Brown's "(Holy Matrimony) Married to the Firm". There are several songs included that were featured in blaxploitation films as well, including Bobby Womack's "Across 110th Street", from the film Across 110th Street, and Pam Grier's "Long Time Woman", from her 1971 film The Big Doll House. The original soundtrack also features separate tracks with dialogue from the film. Instead of using a new film score, Tarantino incorporated Roy Ayers's funk score from the film Coffy.
A number of songs used in the film do not appear on the soundtrack, such as "Cissy Strut" by The Meters and "Piano Impromptu" by Dick Walter.
Although the Special Edition DVD states that the film is presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio, it was actually shot with a 1.85:1 ratio, the only Tarantino-directed film to date shot in the ratio, with the exception of his segment in the film Four Rooms, "The Man from Hollywood".
On October 4, 2011, Miramax released Jackie Brown on Blu-ray with Pulp Fiction. The film is presented in 1080p high definition in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio with a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack. The disc was the result of a new licensing deal with Miramax and Lionsgate.
In 2010, Disney sold off Miramax, with private equity firm Filmyard Holdings taking over and temporarily sublicensing the Miramax catalog to Lionsgate. Qatari company beIN Media Group purchased Miramax from Filmyard Holdings in 2016. In April 2020, Paramount Global bought a 49% stake in Miramax from beIN, which gave them the rights to the catalog of Miramax. The film was subsequently reissued on Blu-ray and DVD by Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment on September 22, 2020, with this being one of many Dimension/Miramax films reissued on DVD/Blu-ray by Paramount in 2020-2021. In 2023, Tarantino is rumored to have personally bought back the rights to Jackie Brown, along with both Kill Bill films, although this has never been officially confirmed. If true, it would leave Pulp Fiction as his only Miramax film still confirmed to be under the control of Paramount. Lionsgate later announced in May 2023 that they had reacquired the home video distribution rights to Jackie Brown, along with both Kill Both films; all three films were released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 10, 2023. The 4K remaster of Jackie Brown
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