A Changing of the Guard

A growing trend of the last several awards seasons has been the increasing amount of recognition for new-school filmmakers such as David Fincher, Christopher Nolan, Danny Boyle, P.T. Anderson, Quentin Tarantino, Wes Anderson, David O. Russell, Darren Aronofsky, and others. All of these guys have been directing films for at least a decade, and a few of them are approaching twenty years of service in Hollywood, so I hesitate to refer to them as new-school, but it's certainly something of a new era in the grand scheme of things.

David Fincher's breakthrough film was 1995's Seven, and he followed that up four years later with Fight Club. Both films were received warmly by moviegoers and critics, but neither were nominated for any major awards. Skip ahead to 2011, and Fincher already has one Oscar nomination for his directorial work in 2008's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. His new film, The Social Network, has been racking up all kinds of awards and nominations over the last month or two. To say that it's the frontrunner for Best Picture at the Oscars this year would be like saying that Charlie Sheen loves hanging with pornstars and doing coke... it's quite obvious.

Directors such as Danny Boyle, Chris Nolan and Tarantino have also been enjoying mainstream success over the last few years. Boyle dominated the Oscars in 2009 with Slumdog Millionaire, and Tarantino got a well-deserved directorial nomination for Inglorious Basterds last year. Chris Nolan pretty much single-handedly caused the AMPAS to expand their best picture field from five to ten films last year, as an overwhelming amount of The Dark Knight supporters voiced their dissent over the film's 2009 Oscar snub. Nolan did score a DGA nomination in 2009, however.

In Retrospect: 'Jackie Brown'

                                          Photo: Miramax

"It's Jackie Brown", mutters Ordell Robbie as he quietly ponders who could have sabotaged his money exchange. In this pivotal and nearly poetic moment, Samuel L. Jackson's character sits in a van, closes his eyes and goes into deep, silent thought as the camera slowly zooms in towards him. He's contemplative, but most importantly, he's finally vulnerable. It's a reaction that's not expected from this character, because all the while before this he's so cool, collected and sure of himself. This scene, like many other scenes in the film, speaks volumes about the enigmatic Jackie Brown, the film's main protagonist. She seems to have the world at her heels.

When I first saw Jackie Brown years ago, I was a young, maniacal Tarantino fanboy, having recently watched Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction---the latter of which I immediately proclaimed to be my favorite film of all time (I still put it in my top three). Needless to say, my expectations for Jackie Brown were very, very high; but like many others, I was somewhat dissapointed, and really felt that the film lacked something that should of been there. I suppose that my initial reactions were that the film was a little too conventional to be a true Tarantino film, and I recall being a little annoyed with the film's slow pacing and long runtime. I had also grown accustomed to Tarantino's blatant disregard for linearity, and was a little offended by the fact that the story unfolded chronologically for most of the way.

Jackie Brown quickly slipped from my memory bank and I really didn't give it much thought until about a year ago, after the release of Inglorious Basterds. I was trying to decide where that one fit in on my list of favorite Tarantino films, and it occurred to me that I should also revisit Jackie Brown as my recollection of it was a bit fuzzy. Over the last year or so, I've probably watched the film three times, and my take on it now is much different than it was back then.