Movie Type: Detective Film, Post-Noir (Modern Noir)
Themes: Private Eyes, Prostitutes, Going Straight
Main Cast: Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Charles Cioffi, Roy Scheider, Dorothy Tristan
Release Year: 1971
Country: US
Run Time: 114 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
The first part of his "paranoia trilogy," Alan J. Pakula's 1971 thriller details the troubled life of a Manhattan prostitute stalked by one of her tricks. Investigating the disappearance of his friend Tom Gruneman (Robert Milli), rural Pennsylvania private eye John Klute (Donald Sutherland) follows a lead provided by Gruneman's associate Peter Cable (Charles Cioffi) to seek out a call girl who Gruneman knew in New York City. The call girl is Bree Daniels (Jane Fonda), an aspiring actress who turns tricks for the cash and to be free of emotional bondage. Klute follows Bree's every move, observing the city's decadence and her isolation, eventually contacting her about Gruneman. Bree claims not to know Gruneman, but she does reveal that she has received threats from a john. As Bree becomes involved in Klute's search and realizes that she is in danger, she reluctantly falls in love with Klute, despite her wish to remain unattached to any man. When she finally comes face to face with the killer, however, she is forced to reconsider her detached urban life. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
Review
With Gordon Willis' cinematography providing a shadowy and claustrophobic atmosphere, Alan J. Pakula adapts the conventions of 1940s film noir detective movies to examine the 1970s issue of the compromises faced by a woman trying maintain her freedom. Klute's air of stark gloom alludes to the pervasive personal conspiracies that put women at the mercy of a man's world; by the end, a crime may be solved, but the problem is not. Despite calls to boycott Jane Fonda's movies because of her anti-Vietnam War activism, Klute's timely subject matter found a substantial audience, firmly establishing Fonda as both a serious movie star and a feminist symbol. Her outspoken views did not prevent her from winning the Best Actress Oscar for the movie. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
Rita Gam - Trina; Fred Burrell - Man in Chicago Hotel; Rosalind Cash - Pat; Candy Darling; Nathan George - Lt. Trask; Anthony Holland - Actor's Agent; Betty Murray - Holly Gruneman; Vivian Nathan - Psychiatrist; Antonia Rey - Mrs. Vanek, Landlady; Richard B. Shull - Sugarman; Joe Silver - Dr. Spangler; Barry Snider - Berger; Jean Stapleton - Goldfarb's Secretary; Shirley Stoler - Momma Rose; Morris Strassberg - Mr. Goldfarb; Lee Wallace - Nate Goldfarb; Mary Louise Wilson - Producer in Adv. Agency; Robert Milli - Tom Gruneman; Jerome Collamore - Custodian; Richard Russell Ramos - Off-Broadway Stage Manager; Tony Major - Bill Azure; Jane White - Janie Dale
Credit
George Jenkins - Art Director, Ann Roth - Costume Designer, William C. Gerrity - First Assistant Director, Alan J. Pakula - Director, Carl Lerner - Editor, Michael Small - Composer (Music Score), Irving Buchman - Makeup, Gordon Willis - Cinematographer, David Lang - Producer, David Lange - Producer, Alan J. Pakula - Producer, John Mortensen - Set Designer, Chris Newman - Sound/Sound Designer, Andy Lewis - Screenwriter, Dave Lewis - Screenwriter
Klute was the first installment of what would informally come to be known as Pakula's "paranoia trilogy." The other two films in the trilogy are The Parallax View (1974) and All The President's Men (1976).
The film begins with the disappearance of Pennsylvania executive Tom Gruneman, whose family hires a friend, police officer John Klute (Sutherland), as a private investigator to look for him. A typewritten obscene letter in Gruneman's desk leads Klute to Bree Daniels (Fonda), a call girl in New York City to whom the letter was addressed.
The relatively provincial Klute becomes drawn into Bree's seedy world, discovers several of Bree's fellow call-girls have been murdered by a "john", and that she was nearly killed by the same man, presumably Gruneman. After an uneasy start, the two work together to track down the killer. Along the way, Klute and cynical city slicker Bree develop an unlikely romance as he becomes protective of her and shows her affection to which she is unaccustomed.
