Tarantino shifts his artistic gears with third effort

Tuesday, 6/24/97 Tarantino shifts his artistic gears with third
effort FILM: Coming out of a slump, director pulls self up with a
‘Jackie Brown’

By Brandon Wilson Summer Bruin Staff Whether it’s a filmmaker,
musician, or novelist, it is the bane of an artist’s existence: two
dreaded words that can strike fear in the heart of even the most
dedicated, brilliant and fearless practitioners of a craft. The
words are sophomore slump. Many a career has been thwarted or ended
prematurely by the sophomore slump, that inability to overcome or
outdo a smashing debut. For every of the aforementioned kinds of
artists, there are those whose second efforts are so disappointing
that their audience lose interest. Then there’s Quentin Tarantino.
Unless you were raised by wolves, you know all about the meteoric
phenomenon of the high school dropout, who took the movie business
like Sherman took Georgia. The ripples of Tarantino’s introduction
to the movies and his own distinct style of storytelling are still
felt, with at least one wannabe "Pulp Fiction" or "Reservoir Dogs"
hitting the screen every other month. Quentin’s slump came not with
his sophomore effort, however; it came after his Oscar-winning
"Pulp Fiction." It came as this frustrated actor seemingly drunk on
his own status as a pop auteur grossly over-exposed himself when
less would’ve been more. Besides a slew of "acting gigs" and
personal appearances, QT has directed a dubious episode of "ER,"
script-doctored "Crimson Tide" and, with crony Robert Rodriguez,
made one of the worst attempts at "exploitation cinema" in a long
time, called "From Dusk Till Dawn." Mr. Tarantino’s star has cooled
a bit since "Pulp Fiction," causing some to wonder if the
foolishness he’s done since the film proved his success to be a
fluke or perhaps he’d be claimed by obscurity as quickly as fame
took hold. But after a period of relative seclusion, Tarantino has
emerged with his first writer-director effort in three years, and
while it may not be exactly what his fans are expecting, the
screenplay to his next film "Jackie Brown" (going before the
cameras this summer in Los Angeles) is a slightly new direction for
someone whose next moves seemed all too predictable. Based on the
novel "Rum Punch" by his idol/guru Elmore Leonard (he’s the one
literary influence QT cops to) the story has been adapted and
remade into a star vehicle for blaxploitation-queen Pam Grier,
another of Tarantino’s favorite people. With a list that includes
Samuel L. Jackson, Bridget Fonda, Michael Keaton and Robert DeNiro,
Grier is heading up one of the best casts of her career, and if she
comes through, she’ll get a career boost like she never expected.
The plot (without giving away too much) is as follows: middle-aged
Brown (Grier) is a flight attendant for a ratty little airline who
supplements her deplorable income by acting as money courier for
Ordell Robbie (Jackson), a buffoonish/ruthless small-time arms
dealer who uses his $500,000 bank account to support himself and a
number of women (Fonda’s Melanie Ralston among them). One day
Jackie gets pinched for muling the cash by LAPD dick Mark Dargis (a
playful allusion to L.A. Weekly movie critic Manohla Dargis?) and
ATF man Nicolet. Jackie, who isn’t exactly a stranger to trouble,
could do time unless she’s willing to help the feds nab Ordell as
he tries to clean out his Mexican bank account. Enter Max Cherry, a
burnt out but honorable bail bondsman who bails Jackie out at
Ordell’s behest. Knowing she’s between a rock and a hard place
since Ordell typically kills his associates if arrested for fear
they’ll rat him out, Jackie enlists the smitten Cherry in her
scheme to play both ends against the middle: do her bit for the
state and mule money for Ordell in cahoots with the feds so they
can nab him, and at the same time get away with the $500,000 Ordell
won’t be needing in prison. The screenplay clocks in at a hefty 167
pages (average length for a script is between 100 and 120 pages),
most of which is dialogue. Yes, many of the old elements are back,
namely Tarantinospeak, and the futzing with linear time the
director is famous for. While that Tarantinospeak is back, this
time around it feels a little more borrowed than before. Sounding
more like Leonard than Tarantino, the talk goes on and on, much
longer than most movies would dare. Most of the time it works.
Sometimes its downright hilarious. The script itself is unusually
well-written (unusual by broad standards, not for Tarantino),
managing to pack in the kind of detail usually reserved for novels
(people don’t just smoke, Tarantino names their brand). He even
takes the unheard-of liberty of using the first person in the
course of his scene description; he qualifies a claim with an "I’m
not just talking about …" line that leaps out at you and serves
to blur the line between script and prose, his probable aim. For
those of you sharing sentiments expressed by Denzel Washington to
Tarantino himself (on the set of "Crimson Tide") who chastised the
director for his constant invocation of the "N" word (you know,
that racial epithet), be warned. "Jackie Brown" has more "N" words
per page than any major Hollywood production since "Harlem Nights."
"N" word or no, talk is definitely king in "Jackie Brown." Even
violence, the other thing associated with QT, is toned down
considerably compared to what he’s done before. There are only
about three or four killings in "Jackie Brown" that are just
straightforward shootings. Nothing fancy, exotic, sensational or
too bizarre. In many ways, "Jackie Brown" is more in the vein of
"Fargo" than "Pulp Fiction;" the players are all recognizably human
and less the bold invention of a movie lover’s feverish imagination
like Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega. (By the way, though
Tarantino loves to weave his stories together with character names
from one film popping up in another, there are no such intertextual
gags in "Jackie Brown," and the only black suit in the film is worn
by Jackie herself). This new direction could be the result of a
maturing process or evolution within the artist. It could be that
this script is the first since QT’s split with silent partner Roger
Avary, whose solo writer-director effort "Killing Zoe" has more in
common with "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction" than "Jackie Brown"
does. This will doubtlessly fuel rumors that Avary was the brains
behind the operation, and QT was just a frontman. More an Elmore
Leonard story than a Quentin Tarantino creation, "Jackie Brown"
will not outperform "Pulp Fiction." Fans are liable to balk at the
new film (which from the script seems to have the requisite killer
soundtrack of ’70’s soul and rock, even a little Kate Bush). And
while it doesn’t rank with some of his past work, it promises to be
better than "True Romance," another story that owes almost as much
to Leonard as this new one. Pam Grier is likely to come out a
winner in all this, but so will Tarantino. It may not turn out to
be huge, but this script is good for Tarantino’s career because
it’s a bit of a departure from previous films, which half the movie
industry (indie and otherwise) are still aping. This could mean
there’s hope for Tarantino yet, although it will be interesting to
see whether he can ever wrench himself free from this genre or
whether he is now bound to it. In any case, Tarantino the
screenwriter has done his job. Now let’s see how Tarantino the
director along with his promising cast breathe life into the words
on a page. Related Link The Screenplays of Quentin Tarantino
Previous Bruin Stories ‘From Dusk Till Dawn’ should not see the
light of dayJanuary 22, 1996 Videobites , October 3, 1995 Related
Links: The Screenplays of Quentin Tarantino Previous Bruin Stories
‘From Dusk Till Dawn’ should not see the light of day
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