Pam Grier can keep her voice level and let the man opposite her mistake composure for weakness. Her action roles made the case for fighting back; Jackie Brown gives us the richer pleasure of watching her think.
Fi1m perspective
In Jackie Brown (1997), Pam Grier holds her chin up and lets the men around her think they have the advantage. Her flight attendant has been caught carrying somebody else's money, but she does not play Jackie as a woman waiting to be told what to do. We rate her most highly here. Grier makes Jackie's composure feel learned through years of dealing with people who assume she can be pushed around.
That resistance was more physical in the early action roles. After women-in-prison films for producer Roger Corman, Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974) made her prominent in blaxploitation cinema. She played Black women fighting exploitation and crime, with toughness and sexuality both central to their appeal. The stock pimps and pushers can limit those films, but Grier gives us a woman capable of taking charge rather than waiting to be rescued.
After the action cycle declined, television and supporting film roles occupied much of the 1980s and early 1990s. Quentin Tarantino brought her back to a leading role with Jackie Brown, giving her a middle-aged working woman with limited options. He gets more from her by allowing her time to assess them. Grier lets the worry show without making Jackie surrender the composure she needs to get through a conversation.
Robert Forster's bail bondsman is the partner this performance needs: someone who can watch without filling the silence. We were moved when he watches Jackie walk towards his car after jail, because his quiet attention gives her a consideration the men handling her case have not. Grier and Forster make that small encounter worth more than another explanation of the scam.
Tarantino does not always know when to leave things alone. The repeated explanations of the plan and the sagging middle stretch make Jackie Brown longer than it needs to be, and we spend too much of it waiting for Grier to return. Give it an evening, with some patience for the stretches that do without her.
Biography
Pam Grier is an American actress. She rose to prominence in the 1970s with leading roles in blaxploitation and action films including Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974).
She portrayed the title character, a flight attendant involved in a smuggling scheme, in Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown (1997). Grier has also appeared in films such as Escape from L.A. (1996) and television series including The L Word (2004–2009).
