Klute is all style and no substance

I saw it when it came out and wasn't impressed. It was a double feature, the other movie was McCabe and Mrs Miller which I liked better.

It was a critical and financial success, but I’m guessing Op already knew that. There is real chemistry between Fonda and Sutherland, who had an affair during filming. Fonda spent time with call girls before filming and doesn’t play Bree as the usual movie prostitute.

The murder plot needs to be seen as an addendum to what is otherwise a psychological portrait of two very different yet equally interesting characters. Of course, if you don't like the characters as well then the movie is a failure.

The same is true of American Gigolo - another film about a prostitute entrapped in a murder mystery.

OP, stick to Housewives, babe.

My memory is it put Fonda back in the game after years of lousy press as Hanoi Jane...

That didn't happen until Coming Home, r5.

What I'll never forget from the first time I saw Klute was a moment when Jean Stapleton appeared in a small role in the middle of the film. All in the Family had become a big TV hit though Stapleton shot her Klute role before that new fame....but the audience broke out in laughter just hearing Edith Bunker's voice onscreen.

As with so many cultural relics of the past, you had to have been there.

It is a bit over stylized and Sutherland is very flat, but this is one of the few movies that will make me praise Jane Fonda.

The last third of the movie is genuinely terrifying and she does a really good job conveying that.

OP, if you hated Klute, try watching Coming Home.

Pauline Kael praised Fonda but was critical of the film's score.

I’ve always loved the scene when Bree kicks up her feet and smokes a roach in her apartment.

Hookers are a reliable bet for an Oscar nom. I guess male Writers are more familiar with them than an ordinary women

Loved everything about it. The dark atmosphere, the eerie score.

My only issue is that the film should've been called "Bree" since it focuses more on Fonda than on Sutherland.

Then it would be Daniels.

Was this movie successful when it came out?

It was the 13th highest grossing film of 1971

Who knew Billy Jack was such a hit

It is odd that movie is called Klute when all the action seems to be from Bree's POV. I wonder if the script began with the character of Klute as the focus and it changed as it was developed as a project for Jane Fonda. But they all loved the catchy title so let it be?

The Bree Daniels hairdo inspired millions of young career girls.

What a good year for movies. I was 12.

At the time, movies like Klute had to be seen at the cinema. One and 1/2 or two years later it would turn up on network TV and so much of it was snipped away.

The Bree Daniels hairdo inspired millions and millions of men, gay and straight, in the 1970s.

Take Me Higher.

The scene where Bree is with a John and is orgasmic and then checks her watch behind his back is an iconic scene.

I thought it was good but overhyped in reputation compared to what it actually was. For over 20 years I heard it was a masterpiece and was a bit letdown by what it actually is.

The Take Me Higher scene is brilliant because Fonda silently expresses a mix of emotions about her lifestyle.

I was underwhelmed by it. Never understood the positive reviews.

R7- Oh Archie!

R26 = Henry Fonda.

It’s fantastic. A really great time capsule of the time. The club scene was shot at the gallery, one of the first dance clubs to play a sound that would eventually be known as disco. The drag queen who comes up to Bree at the club? Thats Warhol superstar Candy Darling. It’s a really well done character study of a sex worker that never sinks into cliche. The fashions and cinematography are fantastic, the writing good (that monologue in the garment factory) and Fonda and Sutherland are great. If you’re a fan of the era, character driven thrillers or either actor it’s a must see

I agree r29!

Roy Scheider looked pretty hot as the pimp.

[quote]r17 = Who knew Billy Jack was such a hit

We who were around at the time were quite aware of its box office status.

[quote] The Bree Daniels hairdo inspired millions of young career girls.

And young boys as well!

And don;t forget middle-aged mothers!

It's called a shag.

R2 Why would I know if it was a success when it came out? I was born in 1979.

Because you know nothing that happened before you were born.

If you're looking for style AND substance, you're much better off watching ME as the gorgeous but deeply troubled elite escort in "Nuts"! Unlike Jane, I wrote and sang the theme song too!!

I find them both interesting actors whatever the circumstances.

I tried to watch it again recently and couldn't get into it- I'm done. It's just too dry and boring. Jane plays her usual nervous, cynical stock character.

Klute came out in ’71, I was in fourth grade. I hadn’t even seen the movie, just the clips in the reviews, but that black sequin turtleneck dress stuck with me. I told my mom she looked great in that dress and suggested she get Jane's shag haircut. She replied oh so you want me to look like a hooker. I hadn’t known that. Oops, I thought that was the most glamorous thing.

Sadly there aren’t any really good photos of said dress. Below is the best I can do.

When I was younger I found a still from one of the opening scenes in Klute, the cattle call Bree attends. I thought it was so striking I had it blown up, framed, and hung in the corner of my apartment like it was fine art.

It still looks great framed.

Do your guests ask if you are in the shot?

It was edgy and interesting for Fonda's portrayal of Bree, something rarely seen then. But this was also the age of Midnight Cowboy and American Gigolo so urban gritty prostitution was of great interest, and the movies were happy to do R-rated and push the envelope a bit. The openness of the 1970s was seeping into mainstream America's consciousness, if not its actions.

I wish.

Why is it named after the Detective that nobody cares about?

He is the protagonist.

[quote]urban gritty prostitution was of great interest

That's urban gritty prostitution?

Where do you live? In rural Wyoming?

Ann Roth who designed the costumes for both Klute and Midnight Cowboy is still with us at age 93. And still designing.

As a kid my favorite movie was Clue, but none of the adults around me had heard of it (they was in the late 80s/early 90s). Every time I would say it, they would think I said Klute, which was a strange choice for a young boy in the south.

It was one of the first truly adult movies I saw (I was in high school) and I found it gripping.

Klute was the first in what critics called Paula’s Paranoia Trilogy. Which continued with The Parallax View and All the President’s Men. The Parallax View is the least mentioned today, but its take on government assassinations was extremely prescient.

^^ DePalma, not Paula. Fuck spellcheck.

I think you mean Pakula.

R54. Absolutely. Jeepers. Sorry about that.

[quote] But this was also the age of Midnight Cowboy and American Gigolo so urban gritty prostitution was of great interest,

American Gigolo was nine years after Klute and eleven years after Midnight Cowboy, and it was not gritty.

I saw Klute when it came out and can remember absolutely nothing about it except for Jane Fonda’s hair.

^ Sydney guilaroff.

Wow! Mr. Sydney really kept up with the changing times.

Now I want to see an AI image of Norma Shearer in the Klute shag.

R26 the reviews were actually rather tepid overall. Fonda was the one who was praised not so much the film

Six months after his best friend has unaccountably disappeared and nobody official has been able to find him, John Klute, a small‐town cop, sets out for New York City to question Bree Daniel, a call girl to whom the missing man has allegedly written obscene letters and who is the only possible clue to his disappearance.

This is the initial proposition to Alan Pakula's “Klute,” which opened yesterday at the Cinerama Theater, and which ought to be called “Bree” (or maybe “Miss Daniel”) because it is really about her and her problems—one of which happens to be a psychopathic killer.

The actual intentions of “Klute” are not all that easy to spot, though I think they have more to do with its intellectual aspirations than with its thriller plot. For this is a thriller in which even the climactic terror (as contrived a terror as any I've seen) seems more like interpersonal relations than climactic terror, and the psychopathic killer, hooked on self‐analysis, keeps a wire re cording of his latest murder, as if to carry his guilt around in his pocket.

At one point in her way through the nightmare of her life Bree takes drugs. Klute (Donald Sutherland), who ‘by this time has grown pretty attached to his only clue, patiently sees her through her withdrawal until she is cured—and then suddenly her apartment, which had been a mess until then, ap pears all waxed floors and newly discovered fireplace, in a good‐taste tenement restoration semi‐traditional that may be a key to the soul of “Klute.”-NYTimes

My favorite scene is early in the film where Bree goes to a casting call at an ad agency and the snarky exec played by Mary Louise Wilson says Bree has weird hands. Also, a young Veronica Hamel is one of the models. Good times.

The radio commercial played often

"Bree Daniel... calls herself an actress..."

Jane winning Oscar no. 1 for it. She had the category to herself, winning the globe and all the critics awards beforehand, so Glenda, Vanessa and Julie decided to stay home. Her father told her don’t get up there and make a political speech, and she followed his advice and told the audience “there’s a great deal to say, and I’m not going to say it tonight “.

Here it is

It’s an early example of Sutherland not taking the most showy role in a film, even though it’s the title role.

[Quote] My only issue is that the film should've been called "Bree" since it focuses more on Fonda than on Sutherland.

Looking at the trailer, I think the film should have been called Don't Answer the Phone

I watched this maybe a year or two ago, on Amazon I think. It was a waste of time for me.

I can't watch most movies made before around 1980, which is about when my memories of TV and movies start. The pacing and acting are all off for me in older stuff.

I played a prostitute twice. Where's my 2nd Oscar?

^ Thrice.

R64. In retrospect, one could make an argument for Glenda Jackson in “Sunday Bloody Sunday” ( same with Peter Finch). They both play very intelligent, complicated people living this triangle as best they can in their everyday life. But neither Fonda (who many had predicted for “They Shoot Horses” two years earlier—she lost to Maggie Smith in “Jean Brodie,” one of those rare instances the Academy opted for nuance and class over celebrity) nor Hackman (who deserved to win for “I Never Sang for My Father” a wonderfully lived-in and subtly moving performances—I would have given it to Melvyn Douglas over George C. Scott too) were going to be ignored (Dan) this time. The three other actress performances were fine, but clearly place keepers—Mary Queen of Scots was dull despite the presence of Redgrave and Jackson, Suzman was good, but Alexandra as written wasn’t compelling, and Christie, one of my favorite actresses, wasn’t yet in the Second Oscar circles—she should have won for Away from Her years later—a much better performance of Alzheimer’s than Julianne Moore’s in Still Alice).

Love the movie

I love the whole film but especially the music. Those wind chime type sounds are so haunting.

I like that jangly music when Bree visits the old man at the garment factory. but that whisper-coo stuff when the killer is stalking her is awful.

Cannes was very amusing. We played baccarat and chemin de fer.

Being a movie nut kid in NY I wasn't old enough to get into R rated movies yet but I scoured the movie sections everyday and I remember there being controversy when Bree looks at her watch during one of her "business" sessions. This was during the beginning of the Women's Lib movement and clearly showed that sex to her was just work.

A snotty nose did get her the Oscar.

Men would pay $200 for me, and here you are turning down a freebie. You could get a perfectly good dishwasher for that.

It made women the world over feel better since they also looked at their watch, R76.

"A snotty nose did get her the Oscar."

It worked for me!

R55 - but Pakula had a DePalma death.

The wife in the opening scene looks like Jessica Lange.

True r80 but at least you could take it off

Betty Murray.

Were there any marital problems?

We were very happy.

In 1971, Jane Fonda's acting in Klute was a revelation and cemented her status as the best actress of her generation. The therapy session scenes, which are basically extended monologues, showcase Fonda's layered performance. Bree is a mix of emotions, trying at first to put on a front of confidence and self-assurance, but the cracks in her voice and pregnant pauses, and expressions of doubt betray her confidence. It was such a raw, honest, and docu-realistic performance that movie audiences of the time were left stunned and in awe.

This was New Hollywood acting at its best and those therapy scenes became a blueprint for other confessional-type movie performances (those in "The Godfather Part II, "Leaving Las Vegas" and "Precious" immediately come to mind").

Pakula had a way of attracting A List actors and then putting them in serious situations where overemoting and showboating would hurt the projects. Fonda in Klute, Beatty in Parallax View, and Redford/Hoffman in All the President’s Men. At the time, that approach, of being a director/auteur really resonated with pretty faces wanting to be taken seriously.

Pakula got the best performance out of Liza Minnelli that she would ever give.

[quote] Pakula got the best performance out of Liza Minnelli that she would ever give.

WANT SOME LUNCH?

r87, are you saying that Pakula knew how to rein in those actors from over-emoting and showboating? I wouldn't disagree but also don't think of any of those actors - Redford, Beatty, Fonda, as natural over-emoters or showboaters.

Well, actually Hoffman and Minnelli certainly could be.

R90 I think that the directors of that era were as significant a draw as their stars and that those stars were more willing to be “directed” than in some other projects. Then Michael Cimino pretty much put an end to that.

I was aware Pakula had died but ignorant of the circumstances until I looked him up after reading this thread.

Such a brutal accident.

Sorry,

[quote] On November 19, 1998, Pakula was driving on the Long Island Expressway in Melville, New York, when a driver in front of him hit a metal pipe, causing it to crash through Pakula’s windshield and strike him in the head. His car swerved off the road and into a fence. He was taken to North Shore University Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

R88, Liza was basically playing herself, no need for a director other than to say action.

R37 I don't know how the audience reacted to the movie in 1971 because I wasn't there. I didn't read the reviews before buying the movie so I don't know if the critics liked it. I just bought it from Criterion because it's a Jane Fonda movie and some people picked it in the Criterion Closet.

Why would I ask a question if I already know the answer?

I think that the directors of that era were as significant a draw as their stars

R91 I don't think people ran to see Klute because it was directed by Pakula. He had only made one film prior - The Sterile Cuckoo. The auteur appeal of directors didn't really kick in until later for guys like Coppola and Scorsese and Spielberg.

I wonder if the killer is meant to be gay. He is said to see prostitutes but beats them up maybe because he can't get it up. And Charles Cioffi certainly plays it in an effete way.

Klute unnerves me as it suggests NYC as moral vacuum infused with utter ambivalence

Charles Cioffi was a guest star in a Very Special Episode of "Little House on the Prairie" called "Cruising: Walnut Grove After Dark!"

He also played Ellyn's father on thirtysomething. We knew he was a bad guy BECAUSE he had been in Klute.

It's an obscene letter.

I WOULD like to see it.