'Jackie Brown' is a great fucking movie.

Aimless:

After completing Pulp Fiction, Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary acquired the film rights to Elmore Leonard's novels Rum Punch, Freaky Deaky, and Killshot. Tarantino initially planned to film either Freaky Deaky or Killshot and have another director make Rum Punch, but changed his mind after re-reading Rum Punch, saying he "fell in love" with the novel all over again.[4] Killshot was later adapted into a film, produced by Jackie Brown producer Lawrence Bender. 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 not only the best of the twenty-six screen adaptations of his novels and short stories, but also stating that it was possibly the best screenplay he had ever read.[4]

Tarantino's screenplay otherwise closely followed Leonard's novel, incorporating elements of Tarantino's trademark humor and pacing.

afaics, Tarantino's best contribution was ensuring Pam Grier played the lead character and bringing Forster in for the main supporting role. The script, as noted, closely followed the novel. If Tarantino had bowed out early and handed over the same cast and script to another director, the movie would probably have worked out just fine.

did you read the script before or after you saw the film?

(xpost) As much as I agree that the performances of Grier/Forster are central--and as much as I'm far from a Tarantino lover--I do think he brought a lot to this that another director wouldn't have. Sam Jackson is, for me, as crucial as Grier/Forster, and I suspect he and Tarantino really worked together to craft that character. Or little things like Johnny Cash as Ordell sits outside Jackie's apartment; that's Tarantino.

The script, as noted, closely followed the novel.

Aimless, did you read the excerpt explaining Tarantino's changing Jackie to a Black woman? That's a major change!

I found this pretty empty and tedious when it came out; but very curious to rewatch as an older viewer -- perhaps the slower rhythms will make more sense. Not a big fan of the novel either - I think it’s the nearest Leonard got to producing a stock “Miami caper” novel.

perfect line

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3e7wbs_xfas

tarantino’s fingerprints are all over this movie, from the script to the soundtrack to the camera angles to the dialogue to the casting to the editing.. ffs just look at get shorty or true romance for a taste of what a “replacement level director” would bring to a story like this

A "script" isn't even a play -- it's a network of suggestions that a resourceful director will modify.

The source material maybe helps the pacing of the movie somehow? I dunno. But t has a much more relaxed vibe than anything else he’s done and I love it so much. It moves at the speed of Forster’s character, and with his same intensity

There's a shot of Forster walking out of a screening at an AMC mall theatre, his hands in his pockets, that's so casually good, so redolent of the character he plays, that no one else could've realized it.

he's walking out of an weekday afternoon screening!

that's a great shot

It’s such a *casual* film, even when shit gets wild.

yeah exactly

It's a great movie, great cast, great book, but to argue any Tarantino movie doesn't have his fingerprints all over it (for better or worse) and that anyone could have done it is crazy

AND he's literally the only director on Earth who was going to cast Forster and Grier as the leads in a movie in 1997

I remember reading an interview with Stephen King where he said his reward for finishing a novel was reading an Elmore Leonard book. I thought that a really wonderful compliment.

it’s a really great version of the kind of films and TV shows I normally hate

and yeah, Tarantino’s fingerprints are all over it. It is a movie out of time, like Forster & DeNiro & Grier, so all the locations & cars & outfits have a very specific 70’s look while also seeming like present day…down to like, the car Forster drives or the loungey carpeted bar they go to, Grier’s airline & uniform. Tarantino cares enough about that granular stuff to hire the kind of ppl who *also* care. Same with the music. To me his specificity is what defines his style

Y'all are my people, y'all know this.

But

https://i.imgur.com/hfHQVoB.gif

lmao

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZNufFkpgIc

sry pplains

please pass the milk, please

AND he's literally the only director on Earth who was going to cast Forster and Grier as the leads in a movie in 1997

yes, and probably the only one with the confidence to play out the entire heist scene twice & at that pace. The film is a miracle.

lol pp

Tarantino more about footprints anyway surely

https://media1.giphy.com/media/BMTzHbtf96few/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e476barkc2oirf4s7whed7dqp8y4ciywyev112uy7d3&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g

QT while he's editing one of the numerous female foot shoots in his movies

Oh no, someone accidentally added sexual overtones to the scene in Jackie Brown where the first woman Louis has seen in many years seduces him, in a manner that establishes her propensity for boundary-pushing. No wonder Sally Menke got fired for this blunder.