Jackie Brown (1997)

Is Jackie Brown (1997) Quentin Tarantino’s most underrated film? It’s less showy than Pulp Fiction (1994), Kill Bill (2003-2004) and Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood` (2019), Jackie Brown brings the past into the present with a great cast including Pam Grier star of many 1970s blaxploitation films, and Robert Forster, lot of sweet soul music and Elmore Leonard’s story involving multiple double-crossings and nasty murders, and a great love story.


Vintage postcard in the Cinemascope Collection, no. 137. Pam Grier as Jackie Brown in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).


Vintage postcard in the Cinemascope Collection, no. 138. Robert Forster as Max Cherry in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).

Elevating a crime novel to a form of sociological comedy

Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997) is the first feature-length film directed by Quentin Tarantino that was based on another work. While adapting Elmore Leonard’s '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 the author as the film was about to start shooting. Leonard loved the screenplay. He considered it not only the best of the twenty-six screen adaptations of his novels and short stories but also stated that it was possibly the best screenplay he had ever read.

In his 1997 review of Tarantino’s third film, Roger Ebert wrote: “This is the movie that proves Tarantino is the real thing, and not just a two-film wonder boy’ It's not a retread of Reservoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction, but a new film in a new style, and it evokes the particular magic of Elmore Leonard - who elevates the crime novel to a form of sociological comedy.

There is a scene here that involves the ex-con Louis (Robert De Niro) and Ordell's druggie mistress (Bridget Fonda) discussing a photograph pinned to the wall, and it's so perfectly written, timed and played that I applauded it. Tarantino has a lot of good scenes in this movie.

The scene where one character lures another to his death by tempting him with chicken and waffles. The scene where a nagging woman makes one suggestion too many. The scene where a man comes around in the morning to get back the gun a woman borrowed the night before. The moment when Jackie Brown uses one line of dialogue, perfectly timed, to solve all of her problems.”



French postcard, no. 655. Samuel L. Jackson as Ordell Robbi in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).


French postcard, no. 657. Robert Forster as Max Cherry in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).

Tarantino's gift is casting

If Quentin Tarantino's strengths are dialogue and plotting, his gift is casting. Pam Grier, goddess of 1970s grindhouse films who, by the 1990s, wasn’t exactly seeing the plum roles pour in, here finds just the right note for Jackie Brown, a tired and desperate flight attendant for a low-rent airline.

Jackie makes a little scratch on the side by smuggling money for her firearms dealer boss (Samuel L. Jackson), but she gets busted. Robert Forster, another actor who’d practically been forgotten at the time, has the role of a career as bail bondsman Max Cherry. Max is a plausible professional, not a plot stooge. Matter of fact about his job and the law, Cherry gets her out of jail and instantly falls in love with her.

Jackson, as Ordell, does a harder, colder version of his hit man in Pulp Fiction, and once again uses the N-word like an obsession or a mantra. Robert De Niro, still in a longtime convict's prison trance, plays Louis as ingratiatingly stupid. Bridget Fonda's performance is so good, it's almost invisible; her character's lassitude and contempt coexist with the need to be high all the time.

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' '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 (Barry Shear, 1972), and Pam Grier's 'Long Time Woman', from her film The Big Doll House (Jack Hill, 1971). The original soundtrack also features separate tracks with dialogue from the film. Instead of using a new film score, Tarantino incorporated Roy Ayers' funk score from the film Coffy (Jack Hill, 1973).


French postcard by Sonis, no. C 867. Photo: Miramax / A Band Apart / BAC Films. Bridget Fonda as Melanie Ralston in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997). Caption: Christmas Day.


French promotion card by BacFilms. Michael Keaton as Ray Nicolette in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).

A love letter to the second chance

Jackie Brown (1997) received positive reviews and grossed $74.7 million worldwide on a $12 million budget. Roger Ebert: "You savour every moment of Jackie Brown. Those who say it is too long have developed cinematic attention deficit disorder. I wanted these characters to live, talk, deceive and scheme for hours and hours."

It earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Robert Forster, and Golden Globe Award nominations for Samuel Jackson and Pam Grier. The film revitalised the careers of Grier and Forster, neither of whom had been cast in a lead role for many years.

Jackie Brown also attracted criticism for its use of the racial slur ‘nigger’, which is used 38 times. During an interview with Manohla Dargis, Tarantino said: "The minute any word has that much power, as far as I'm concerned, everyone on the planet should scream it. No word deserves that much power."

Director Spike Lee: "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 made – an honorary black man?" Lee took his concerns to the film's producers, Harvey Weinstein and Lawrence Bender. But in Tarantino’s later films Django Unchained (2012) and The Hateful Eight (2015), the word was even used more.

In 2023, Time magazine chose Jackie Brown as one of the 10 best films of the 1990s. In her comment, Time’s Stepanie Zacharek concluded: "Yet the movie is filled with love, chiefly Tarantino’s love for Forster and Grier, two actors he was nuts about as a kid, and they’re glorious here. Jackie Brown is Tarantino’s warmest movie, a love letter to the second chance. Everybody deserves one.” And is Jackie Brown (1997) Quentin Tarantino’s most underrated film? We think so.


French postcard, no. 654. Photo: publicity still for Jackie Brown. (Quentin Tarantino, 1997) with Robert De Niro as Louis Gara.


French promotion card by BacFilms. Robert Forster in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).


British postcard by Heroes Publishing LTD, London, no. SFC 3308. Pam Grier in Jackie Brown (Quentin Tarantino, 1997).

Sources: Stephanie Zacharek (Time), Roger Ebert (Roger Ebert.com), Claudio Carvalho (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.

Jane Greer

American film and television actress Jane Greer (1924-2001) started her career as a model and a big band singer. Throughout her career, she starred in 28 films and 17 TV series. Greer is best known for her role as the sassy, sensual femme fatale Kathie Moffat in the Film Noir Out of the Past (1947). Its complex, fatalistic storyline, dark cinematography, and classic femme fatale garnered the film critical acclaim and cult status.


British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London no. W. 686. Photo: R.K.O. Radio.

The golden cage of Howard Hughes

Bette Jane Greer was born in Washington, D.C., in 1924. She was the daughter of Charles Durell McClellan Greer Jr. and his wife, Bettie, who wrote children's stories. As a baby, ‘Bettejane’ already won a beauty contest and from her teenage years, she worked as a model for furs. At 15, she suffered facial paralysis and she later claimed that it was the subsequent therapeutic exercises that enabled her to express herself as an actress.

Thanks to her good looks and her attractive contralto voice she first started a career as a singer. She dropped out of her senior year at high school to work as a vocalist in a nightclub. She mostly sang for Enric Madriguera's orchestra at the Latin Club Del Rio in Washington, D.C. and sang phonetically in Spanish. She also performed on the radio where she met singer, entertainer, actor and bandleader Rudy Vallee.

In 1942, Bettejane appeared on the cover of Life magazine modelling army uniforms for women. The eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes reportedly noticed the 18-year-old and gave her a contract with RKO Pictures. Hughes managed to keep Greer under a kind of house arrest for five months. "Hughes was obsessed with me," she said many years later. "But at first it seemed as if he were offering me a superb career opportunity." She flew the obsessed Hughes and quickly married Rudy Vallee in 1943. An enraged Hughes pressured her and ruined the marriage. The couple separated after three months and divorced in 1944.

She returned to Hughes and her contract. At first, RKO gave her bit parts as showgirls in three films under her real name Bettejane Greer. She made her uncredited film debut in the romantic comedy Pan-Americana (John H. Auer, 1945). In 1945, Greer had her name legally changed to Jane Greer by a court in Los Angeles. She had bigger roles in the Film Noir Two O'Clock Courage (Anthony Mann, 1945) and Dick Tracy (William Berke, 1945), starring Russ Conway. This was a film adaptation of the Dick Tracy comic strip created by Chester Gould. It was the first of four instalments of the Dick Tracy film series, released by RKO Radio Pictures.

Greer had her breakthrough as femme fatale Kathie Moffat in the now classic Film Noir Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947). Ronald Bergan in The Guardian: “She came into her own as one of the great two-timing dames in Jacques Tourneur's superb film noir Out of The Past, a part that was enough to make her one of the icons of the genre. As the femme fatale who coldly seduces Robert Mitchum in his first starring role, Greer changes character expertly to suit her particular needs, remote one moment, charming the next.” Greer co-starred with Robert Young and Susan Hayward in the Film Noir They Won't Believe Me (Irving Pichel, 1947), produced by Alfred Hitchcock's longtime assistant and collaborator, Joan Harrison.


British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D. 249. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. James Mason and Jane Greer in The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952).


British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D. 250. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. James Mason, Robert Douglas and Jane Greer in The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952).

As long as I own the studio, you won't work

In 1947, Jane Greer married the lawyer and businessman Edward Lasker with whom she had three children. Even though Greer was now married, Hughes, in a noirish twist of fate, had just bought RKO, and was still interested in her romantically, writes Ronald Bergan. When Greer resisted him, Hughes barked out, "As long as I own the studio, you won't work." However, he relented and cast her to co-star once again with starred alongside Robert Mitchum, in another Film Noir, the fast-paced The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949).

Greer's last film for RKO was The Company She Keeps (1950) as a deceitful ex-con, making a play for the boyfriend of her parole officer (Lizabeth Scott). In one scene, the baby in her arms is Jeff Bridges, making his screen debut. At MGM, she appeared in the war comedy You're in the Navy Now (Henry Hathaway, 1951) opposite Gary Cooper.

In 1952, Greer co-starred in one of her best-known films, the Swashbuckler The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952). Opposite Stewart Granger and James Mason, she was great as the plotting Antoinette de Mauban. In 1953, Greer largely withdrew from the film business for her family life. In the following decades, she only took on roles sporadically. Most were guest appearances in television series.

In the cinema, she co-starred with James Cagney in the dark dramatic film Man of a Thousand Faces (Joseph Pevney, 1957) detailing the life of silent film actor Lon Chaney. She played the second wife of Chaney. In 1984, she played the role of Kathie Moffat (Rachel Ward)'s mother, Jessie Wyler, in Against All Odds (Taylor Hackford, 1984), the remake of Out of the Past (1947). One of her last roles was that of the restaurant critic and failed actress Vivian Smythe Niles in David Lynch's mystery series Twin Peaks (1990).

In 2001, Jane Greer died of cancer at the age of 76 in Los Angeles and was buried in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. For her contribution to cinema, a star was dedicated to her on the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame. She divorced Edward Lasker in 1963. From 1965, she was the companion of actor and dialogue coach Frank London until he died in 2001, six months before Greer died. Jane Greer was the mother, with Edward Lasker, of Alex Lasker, Steven Lasker, and Lawrence Lasker. Lawrence Lasker was twice nominated for an Oscar - as the producer of Awakenings (Penny Marshall, 2001) and as the screenwriter of WarGames (John Badham, 1983). His brother Alex Lasker is also active in the film industry and is known as the screenwriter of such films as Firefox (Clint Eastwood, 1982), Beyond Rangoon (John Boorman, 1995) and Tears of the Sun (Antoine Fuqua, 2003).


West German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. V 311. Photo: R.K.O. Radio. Jane Greer in The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949).


Belgian postcard, no. 252. Photo: 20th Century Fox. Jane Greer (not Green) in You're in the Navy Now (Henry Hathaway, 1951).

Sources: Ronald Bergan (The Guardian), Jack Johnson (IMDb), Wikipedia (Dutch, German and English), and IMDb.

Franco Interlenghi

Italian actor Franco Interlenghi (1930-2015) was a popular leading man during the 1950s and worked with major directors like De Sica, Fellini, Antonioni, Bolognini and Rossellini. Although Interlenghi never gained international stardom, he was just as revered in his country as Marcello Mastroianni.


Italian autograph card. Signed in 1958.


Vintage photo. Anna Baldini and Franco Interlenghi in Domenica d'agosto/A Sunday in August (Luciano Emmer, 1950).


With Antonella Lualdi. Italian postcard by Bromofoto, Milano, no. 1234. Photo: Italy's News Photos.


French postcard. Photo: Sam Lévin.


Italian postcard by Bromofoto, Milano, no. 1119. Photo: ENIC. Franco Interlenghi in Altair (Leonardo De Mitri, 1956).

Shoeshine

Franco Interlenghi was born in Rome, Italy in 1931 (some sources say 1930). At 15 years old, he made his film debut in a classic of the Italian neorealist cinema, Sciuscià/Shoeshine (Vittorio De Sica, 1946). De Sica used nonprofessional actors, and he painted an uncompromising picture of the lives of Italian street children abandoned by their parents at the end of World War II.

Sciuscià/Shoeshine (Vittorio De Sica, 1946) concentrates on two such children, Giuseppe (Rinaldo Smerdoni) and Pasquale (Franco Interlenghi). With no one else to turn to, the boys form a solid friendship, as well as a ‘corporation’ of sorts: they eke out a living shining the boots of American GIs.

In an interesting article unfortunately removed by AllMovie, Hal Erickson called Sciuscià 'a must-see example of Italian neorealist cinema': "A failure in Italy (director Vittorio De Sica noted that postwar Italian audiences preferred the glossy escapism emanating from Hollywood), Shoeshine was a huge success worldwide, as well as the winner of a special Academy Award. Like Bicycle Thieves, it combines De Sica's frequent focus on children with his emphasis on post-war social problems."

In the following years, young Franco appeared in more successful films like the historical epic Fabiola (Alessandro Blasetti, 1949) starring Michèle Morgan, and the neorealist comedy Domenica d'agosto/A Sunday in August (Luciano Emmer, 1950).

He played the son of Communist mayor Peppone (Gino Cervi) in the comedy classic Don Camillo/The Little World of Don Camillo (Julien Duvivier, 1952) featuring Fernandel. Other films in which he appeared were the murder drama Processo alla città/The City Stands Trial (Luigi Zampa, 1952), and the Homer adaptation Ulisse/Ulysses (Mario Camerini, 1954) starring Kirk Douglas and Silvana Mangano.


Vintage photo. Anna Baldini and Franco Interlenghi in Domenica d'agosto/A Sunday in August (Luciano Emmer, 1950).


Vintage photo. Anna Baldini and Franco Interlenghi in Domenica d'agosto/A Sunday in August (Luciano Emmer, 1950).


Italian postcard by Casa Edite. Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze, no. 3155. Photo: Dear Film.


Italian postcard in the Divi del Cinema series by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 70.


Italian postcard by Turismofoto.

Layabouts

Franco Interlenghi is probably best remembered for his leading role in Federico Fellini’s beautiful I Vitelloni/Spivs (1953). I Vitelloni follows the lives of five young vitelloni, or layabouts, who while away their listless days in a small seaside village. While the film seems to pay little attention to Moraldo (Interlenghi), he eventually emerges as its key character, plainly serving as Fellini's alter ego.

Franco Interlenghi worked that same year with another maestro, Michelangelo Antonioni, at I Vinti/The Vanquished (1953), a triptych film featuring three murders in London, Paris and Rome.

Interlenghi appeared in supporting parts in several Hollywood productions filmed on location in Italy, like Teresa (Fred Zinnemann, 1951) with Pier Angeli, The Barefoot Contessa (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1954) starring Ava Gardner and Humphrey Bogart, and A Farewell to Arms( Charles Vidor, who replaced John Huston, 1957) with Rock Hudson.

In France, he starred opposite Brigitte Bardot and Jean Gabin in En Cas de malheur/Love is My Profession (Claude Autant-Lara, 1958).

Among his well-known Italian films of the 1950s were also Gli Innamorati/Wild Love (Mauro Bolognini, 1955) with his wife Antonella Lualdi, the comedy Totò, Peppino e i... fuorilegge/Totò, Peppino and the Outlaw (Camillo Mastrocinque, 1956) starring comedians Totò and Peppino de Filippo, the comedy Padri e figli/Like Father, Like Son (Mario Monicelli, 1957), the war drama Il generale della Rovere/General della Rovere (Roberto Rossellini, 1959) featuring Vittorio De Sica, and the crime drama La notte brava/Bad Girls Don’t Cry (Mauro Bolognini, 1959), again opposite Antonella Lualdi.


Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 562.


Italian postcard in the Hobby series by Bromostampa, Milano, no. L. 15.


Italian postcard in the Divi del Cinema series by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 179.


German minicard by Ufa-Film-Foto. Photo: Unitalia-Film.


Italian postcard by La Rotografica Romana. Photo: Cines / ENIC. Claude Laydu, Antonella Lualdi, Franco Interlenghi, Jacques Sernas and others in Altair (Leonardo De Mitri, 1956).

Sexploitation

Although Franco Interlenghi would never gain international stardom, he was a popular film actor in his home country. In addition to films, he also appeared in successful theatrical productions. He worked with famous director Luchino Visconti on an adaptation of 'Death of a Salesman'.

In the 1960s and 1970s, he appeared less often in the cinema. His films from this period include the historical drama Viva l'Italia!/Garibaldi (Roberto Rossellini, 1961), the crime film Mise a Sac/Pillaged (Alain Cavalier, 1967), the historical romance Columna/The Column (Mircea Dragan, 1968), and the Western Amore, piombo e furore/China 9, Liberty 37 (Monte Hellmann, 1978) with Fabio Testi and Warren Oates.

In the following decades, he was seen more regularly in films and also on TV. His roles were however smaller and the films less successful than during the 1950s. He appeared in supporting parts in the crime drama Il Camorrista/The Professor (Giuseppe Tornatore, 1986) starring Ben Gazzara, the Molière adaptation L’avare/The Miser (Tonino Cervi, 1990) starring Alberto Sordi, the psychological thriller L’ours en peluche/The Teddybear (Jacques Deray, 1994) with Alain Delon, and the drama Marciando Nel Buio/Marching in the dark (Massimo Spano, 1995), about the brutal rape of a young soldier and his attempts to bring the culprit to justice. He also appeared in a sexploitation film by Tinto Brass, Miranda (Tinto Brass, 1985).

Later films were the sweeping crime drama Romanzo Criminale/Crime Novel (Michele Placido, 2005) starring Kim Rossi Stuart, and the comedy sequel Notte prima degli esami – Oggi/The Night Before the Exams - Today (Fausto Brizzi, 2007).

When he died in 2015, Franco Interlenghi was still married to Antonella Lualdi. He was 83. The couple married in 1955 and their marriage was one of the happiest in the Italian film community. Both their daughter, Antonellina Interlenghi and their granddaughter, Virginia Sanjust Di Teulada are actors too.


Trailer Sciuscià/Shoeshine (1946). Source: Umbrella Entertainment (YouTube).


I Vinti/The Vanquished (1953). Source: Film&Clips (YouTube).


Trailer I Vitelloni/Spivs (1953) with Alberto Sordi and Franco Interlenghi. Source: Umbgu (YouTube).


How to Knock a Kiss: Antonella Lualdi and Franco Interlenghi. A delightful clip by Mr. Rug Cutter with footage from Gli Innamorati (Mauro Bolognini, 1955) and music by Three Suns, 'Movin`N´Groovin'. Source: Mr. Rug Cutter (YouTube).

Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie - page now defunct), Sandra Brennan (AllMovie - page now defunct), Les gens du cinema (French), Wikipedia and IMDb.