8. Jackie Brown (1997)

Starring Pam Grier (Escape from L.A.) in the titular role, Tarantino’s Jackie Brown is a crime film based on the Elmore Leonard novel Rum Punch. The movie pays homage to the blaxploitation films of the 1970s, including Grier’s other well-known pictures Foxy Brown and Coffy. This flick sparked new life into Grier’s feature film career as she, along with leading man Robert Forester (The Descendants), hadn’t featured as the main star for many years.

The film follows Jackie Brown (Grier), a flight attendant with a criminal past who is nabbed for smuggling, only to become an informant for the FBI while trying to preserve her life in the process. The film also stars frequent Tarantino collaborator Samuel L. Jackson (Shaft) as gun runner Ordell Robbie, Robert De Niro (Goodfellas) as recently released convict Louis Gara, Bridget Fonda (Single White Female) as no-hoper Melanie Ralston, and Forester as bail bondsman Max Cherry. Jackie Brown served to be Tarantino’s only film adaptation based exclusively on previously existing work and is a fun blaxploitation feature that constantly asks the dangerous question: who is playing who?

7. The Hateful Eight (2015)

Tarantino’s eighth motion picture, The Hateful Eight (aptly named) is a Revisionist Western about eight strangers who seek shelter from a blizzard in Minnie’s Haberdashery. Set in late 1800s Wyoming, the movie was originally conceived as a sequel to his earlier film Django Unchained. Tarantino retooled the story as a stand-alone feature with entirely new characters. In fact, Tarantino actually re-edited the film into a four-hour mini-series for Netflix a few years back.

Kurt Russell once again stars as bounty hunter John “The Hangman” Ruth alongside QT trademark Samuel L. Jackson as Major Marquis Warren, Jennifer Jason Leigh (Atypical) as the fugitive Daisy Domergue, and Walton Goggins (Justified) as wannabe sheriff Chris Mannix, among others. QT’s attention to detail and tactical subversions make this film a work of art. Plus, Ennio Morricone (The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly) re-emerged to score this film, which is insanely cool!