The NFL great earned his spurs in these four movies available for streaming and purchase on line.
When the acting bug bit NFL great Jim Brown, it bit hard.
So hard, in fact, that the eight time All-Pro player — whose birthday we celebrate today — took a pass on continuing his gridiron career while he was still at the top of his game, to concentrate solely on a full-time career in films and television.
No joke: While he on location in London to play his second major film role — in The Dirty Dozen (1966) — production delays prevented his return to the U.S. in time for the first part of his Cleveland Browns training camp. Reportedly, this angered Browns owner Art Modell so much, he threatened to fine Brown $1,500 for each week of camp he missed. Brown responded by holding a press conference in London to announce that, at age 30, he was retiring from football. So there.
Brown, who was 80 when he died in 2023, went on to star in dozens of movies and TV shows, including Ice Station Zebra (1968) opposite Rock Hudson, Patrick McGoohan and Ernest Borgnine; The Split (1969) opposite Gene Hackman, Donald Sutherland and Warren Oates; Slaughter’s Big Rip-Off (1973), opposite Ed McMahon, Don Stroud and Gloria Hendry; and I'm Gonna Git You Sucka (1988), opposite Keenan Ivory Wayans, Berney Casey and Isaac Hayes.
The Georgia-born actor-athlete also starred in four westerns available for rental or purchase on various platforms.
Rio Conchos (1964)
For his big-screen debut, Jim Brown boldly jumped right off into the deep end of the pool by playing a key supporting role opposite seasoned actors Richard Boone, Stuart Whitman, Anthony Franciosa and Edmond O’Brien. And he impressively managed to more than hold his own while in such stellar company as Sgt. Franklyn, a stoic Buffalo Solider who joins Capt. Haven (Whitman) on an impossible mission to retrieve or destroy stolen Army rifles before former Rebel colonel Theron “Gray Fox” Pardee (O’Brien) sells the weapons to Apaches. Also along for the ride: Jim Lassiter (Boone), an ex-Confederate officer who’s “convinced” to lead the team to Pardee; and Juan Luis Rodriguez (Franciosa), a knife-wielding Mexican bandit who accompanies Lassiter in order to avoid execution. Best scene: Lassiter gets medieval on an unenlighted bartender who’s unwilling to serve a Black man (Franklyn). It may remind you of the moment when, 25 years later, Robert Duvall chastised a rude bartender in Lonesome Dove.
100 Rifles (1969)
Director Tom Gries (Will Penny, Breakheart Pass) stirred up controversy — and, yes, generated publicity — by including a steamy close encounter between Jim Brown and Raquel Welch (cast as Sarita, a Yaqui Indian revolutionary who knows what boys like) in his rough-and-tumble action flick about an Arizona lawman (Brown) caught between downtrodden Yaqui peasants and a sadistic Mexican military commander (Fernando Lamas) while pursuing a roguish bank robber (Burt Reynolds). But the movie works best when it concentrates on another relationship. As critic Roger Ebert noted: “Brown and Reynolds are good together; Brown has a cool, humorous charm and Reynolds plays to it like the other half of a vaudeville team.”
El Condor (1970)
Jim Brown and Lee Van Cleef bring out the best in each other as a mismatched pair of adventurers who propel the plot of this uneven but often exciting western directed by John Guillermin (The Blue Max, The Towering Inferno). Brown plays Luke, a tough customer who breaks free of a chain gang after a fellow convict (Elisha Cook Jr.) tells him of a legendary Mexican fortress where troops guard a fortune in gold bars. He teams up with Jaroo, a hard-drinking con man who very conveniently is a good buddy of Santana (Iron Eyes Cody), leader of a tribe of renegade Apaches more than willing to raid the fortress for food and ammunition. Meanwhile, inside the fort, Chavez (Patrick O’Neal), the demanding commander, keeps in shape while fighting bulls in his very own bullring (as a kinda-sorta warm-up for his climactic clash with Brown’s Luke). Throughout his entire career, Van Cleef never played another a role that enabled him to get as many laughs with his comic relief as he does here with Jaroo. Even Brown can’t help cracking a grin now and then while his co-star dials it up to 11, though he’s scrupulously careful about never breaking character.
Take a Hard Ride (1975)
Italian filmmaker Antonio Margheriti (a.k.a. Anthony Dawson) generously borrowed elements from the Spaghetti Western and Blaxploitation genres for this rousing mash-up that reunited Jim Brown and Lee Van Cleef — but not to play on-screen allies. Brown plays Pike, loyal cattle boss for a wealthy rancher (Dana Andrews), who vows to bring the $86,000 in profits from a successful sale back to the village of Sonora after the rancher suffers a fatal heart attack. At first, Pike is reluctant to trust Tyree (Fred Williamson), a sly and spiffily-dressed gambler, as a cross-country traveling companion. But he eventually sees the wisdom of having another gun on his side as he’s pursued by a remorseless bounty hunter (Van Cleef), a corrupt lawman (Barry Sullivan), a scurvy thief (Harry Carey Jr.) and, oh, I dunno, about seven or eight dozen other bad guys who want to claim the $86,000 for their own. Jim Kelly (Black Belt Jones) helps to even the odds for the good guys as Kashtok , a mute half-Black, have-Native martial artist whose fists (and feet) of fury indicate Margheriti also watched a few Bruce Lee movies as well before starting work on this flick.
