One of my favorite lines of dialogue is from Quentin Tarantino’s film, Jackie Brown. The exchange is just a few seconds long, but it does a great jo

The Riddle of Ambition

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2024-04-22 08:30:09

One of my favorite lines of dialogue is from Quentin Tarantino’s film, Jackie Brown. The exchange is just a few seconds long, but it does a great job introducing the tension that I’d like to discuss today.

Samuel L. Jackson plays Ordell Robbie, a gun runner that’s looking to smuggle in half a million dollars from Mexico. He’s brash, driven by greed, and won’t take “no” for an answer. Any opportunity with a dollar sign on it, he rushes to take.

His roommate / not-quite-girlfriend is Melanie Ralston, and in almost every scene, she’s holding a bong. She doesn’t care about anything else but the TV show she’s watching and the quality of the weed she’s smoking. As long as the bong is lit, all is well in the world.

In this scene, Ordell is getting ready to leave the house and scope out a venture. He’s pumped and ready to go, only to see Melanie on the couch once again to revisit her cylindrical friend. With a look of admonishment, he furrows his eyebrows and says:

When I first heard this exchange, I just thought it was funny. But the fact that I can still recall it means that there’s something deeper about it that’s stuck with me. And I’ve since realized that it does a great job highlighting the paradox of ambition.