Movies I Love: Klute

Some movies (KLUTE, THE MISFITS, THE LION IN WINTER, CHARADE) I never need to see again, as I saw them so many times that every moment of them is imprinted on my brain. This 1971 Alan Pakula film made an enormous impression on me at the time, and I returned to it several times. Everything about it worked so perfectly: the creepy atmosphere, New York in the early '70s, Jane Fonda's best ever performance as Bree Daniels the call-girl who thinks she is in control of her 'Johns' - and Donald Sutherland in another of his best roles as the withdrawn detective John Klute being drawn into her web as he becomes fascinated by her. Those scenes of Jane as Bree totally in character out on the crowded streets, or visiting clients like Mr Goldfarb while Klute watches, or alone in her apartment, as Michael Small's score ramps up the feeling she is being watched and then there is Gordon Willis' stunning photography.



Alan Pakula, who used to produce those Robert Mulligan films like TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER, BABY THE RAIN MUST FALL, had a great eye for detail and certainly knew how to get the best out of his actresses: Liza Minnelli in THE STERILE CUCKOO (POOKIE), Maggie Smith in LOVE AND PAIN AND THE WHOLE DAMN THING, and Jane Fonda here. I liked Jane in BARABARELLA and those other frothy confections of hers and her Gloria was totally compelling in 1969's THEY SHOOT HORSES DON'T THEY for Sidney Pollack. Here as Bree she is the bit-part actress who turns tricks (checking her watch midway), visits her analyst as she discusses her reasons for wanting to be in control. Then slowly she and the visiting detective get to know each other, he sees her at her worst when she is drugged and out of it, and he puts her back together. There is that lovely moment when they are out shopping and she impulsively tugs his clothes as she realises they are a couple, only to find her apartment has been violated when they return ... then the creepy climax as she ascends in the lift to the empty factory where the killer is waiting, and he pours out his hate for her and the girls like her who leech off him, which is why he killed the other girls.



Klute is investigating the disappearance of a colleague in their small town who has vanished after a trip to New York. Charles Cioffi is the concerned friend who is paying for Klute to find out what happened. We see the underbelly of the big city then, as Bree takes Klute to visit her haunts, her old pimp Roy Scheider, and friends like Rita Gam, a chic lesbian, and Shirley Stoler. Then there is that desperate addicted prostitute Arlyn Page (Dorothy Tristan) whom the murderer also visits as she is supposed to have kept a diary .... Bree listening to the tape playback of Arlyn's murder as the killer has her cornered is part of the stunning climax - it is one of the best ever female performances. The aftermath is nice too with them leaving the city, but maybe she will be back ... I just loved everything about this, including the great widescreen vistas and the quiet intimate moments. It looks a little dated now with those early '70s fashions and hair-do's but that does not matter. Jane in that black sequin backdress dress is as glamorous as Dietrich in the '30s ...



Pakula did it again with THE PARALLAX VIEW in 1974, that other stunning conspiracy thriller capturing the paranoia of the times, as Warren Beatty sets out to discover what exactly is happening to all the witnesses of a politican assassination. It is another riveting experience and a key '70s film like KLUTE, CHINATOWN, THE STEPFORD WIVES and Pakula's huge success ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN. Pakula (1928-1998, he was killed in a freak accident while driving) also directed hits like SOPHIE'S CHOICE and PRESUMED INNOCENT, where Harrison Ford scores in this Scott Turow thriller.





Coming up: more People We Like: Peter Finch, Alan Bates, David Warner, Malcolm McDowell, and a brace of new European titles: 6 Catherine Deneuve films, 3 more Romy Schneiders, 2 more Anouk Aimees, 4 Gerard Philipe discoveries including Vadim's LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES with Jeanne Moreau! and Antonioni's rare OBERWALD MYSTERY with Monica Vitti, and his segment in I TRI VINTI.

Cinema obscura - some more European rarities...

That Michelangelo Antonioni has a lot to answer for... The early '60s saw European cinema awash with "imitiation Antonioni" all trying to recreate the mood of Antonioni's masterpieces. This one, IL MARE (THE SEA) made in 1962 even played at London's premiere art house, the now defunct Academy in Oxford Street, in '64. As directed by Guiseppe Patroni Griffi its a moody piece with long pauses about 3 people, or lost souls, in out-of-season wintry Capri: The Man (Umberto Orsini), The Woman (Francoise Prevost) and The Boy (Dino Mele). It hasn't been seen here since but I saw it at the time and still remember the unintentional hilarity of them stalking each other: The Man sleeps with The Woman, but seems to want The Boy. The Boy and The Woman become friends - she is taking masochistic pleasure in selling her house to a wealthy vulgarian as part of her divorce; The Man and The Boy seem to be flirting with each other - is there going to be a threesome or not? Griffi is very "school of Antonioni", [French actress Prevost also scored about then in a tense British thriller PAYROLL with Michael Craig and Billie Whitelaw]. I will be in Capri myself next month (as part of a trip to Sorrento and Amalfi), wonder if I will recognise any locations?

(Bisexuality and threesomes also raised their head in Griffi's next, A SMALL CIRCLE OF FRIENDS in '69, which was more art house soft porn, and featured actors like Jean-Louis Trintignant and Annie Girardot as well as the smouldering Brazilian Florinda Bolkan. Griffi also directed the art house hit TIS PITY SHE'S A WHORE in 1971, with the incestous Charlotte Rampling, Fabio Testi and Olivier Tobias, which was very bloody and looked teriffic with those renaissance settings and costumes and lots of nudity ... One of his last credits was that bizarre Elizabeth Taylor film THE DRIVER'S SEAT, in 1974, which seemed an incoherent mess when I saw it last week, it was in fact so boring that I had to see most of it on fast-forward! Andy Warhol was among those involved (and a more mature Dino Mele from IL MARE) but why on earth did Taylor bother to appear in it? - even it is from a Muriel Spark book. She plays a disturbed woman [as is evident from her wardrobe] travelling around Europe looking for a man to murder her...)

Another Rene Clement treat! After re-discovering his 1954 KNAVE OF HEARTS (or MONSIEUR RIPOIS) with Gerard Philipe and Joan Greenwood recently, and his classic PLEIN SOLEIL (see separate post on here) and the '58 THE SEA WALL (or THIS ANGRY AGE), ditto posted here - here is his splendid 1964 thriller LES FELINS (THE FELINES), also called JOY HOUSE or THE LOVE CAGE (which would seem the better title). Henri Decae's crisp black and white Cinemascope images, a terrific score by Lalo Schifrin, Alain Delon's first English speaking film and Jane Fonda's first French, what's not to like? It exists in both French and English versions on the disk. Then there is that little seen superb actress Lola Albright ... she is a wealthy widow of a mobster who has a luxury mansion on the French riviera, Fonda is her cousin staying with her; Delon (not as engaging as his Tom Ripley - he is just a blank cypher here) is the guy on the run from some mobsters who is taken in by the two women, who find him in a refuge for the homeless. What are their motives? Who is the strange person behind two way mirrors who is hiding in the house? The goons sent by the mobster turn up again ... its nicely worked out and the jazzy score by Schifrin is a distinct bonus. I will now have to finally see Clement's all-star IS PARIS BURNING? which must be worth investigating, featuring as it does, in 1966, Welles, Belmondo, Delon, Caron, Perkins, Montand, Signoret, Kirk Douglas and Glenn Ford. Not quite one of the New Wave brigade, his films are certainly fascinating, I also need to see those early ones of his like FORBIDDEN GAMES and GERVAISE.
Below: Clement directing Delon and Fonda.

LA RONDE - Roger Vadim's 1964 remake of Ophuls' 1950 classic is worth a look too, seeing as it features the crop of new European players of the early 60s: Jane Fonda in her first with Vadim, Anna Karina, Catherine Spaak, Maurice Ronet, Jean Sorel, etc. They wear the period clothes but somehow just look too modern - perhaps the hairstyles and make up are too modern for the period? Its the usual round of assignations played out in the Belle Epoque period ... perhaps just an excuse to feature these players and have a bit of fun ? The cast is a who's who of the 60s French cinema, as was the Ophuls film was (with Signoret, Simone, Darrieux, et al) Francoise Dorleac is supposed to have a small part too, but I couldn't see her. Vadim's LA CUREE (THE GAME IS OVER) with Fonda and Peter McEnery seems to have vanished, but was a delirious delight at the time.



THE BEST WAY TO WALK - This 1976 film by Claude Miller was a hit on the London art house circuit at the time, I wonder if it stands the test of time? Claude Miller has made some interesting films in France since the 70s - I recall Depardieu in a Highsmith adaptation THIS SWEET SICKNESS, and GARDE DE VUE with Romy Schneider in one of her last roles. THE BEST WAY TO WALK (LA MILLEURE FACON DE MARCHER) is an intriguing tale of the conflict between two teachers at a summer camp, as one - Patrick Dewaere - is a bit of a bully and seizes on the gentler other - Patrick Bouchitey - whom he is always picking on - there is a simmering sexual undercurrent which comes to the fore when Dewaere catches Bouchitey in drag, dressed in his girlfriend's clothes, which confirms his feelings about him. Violence ensures and there is a nice coda set in Paris some years later, when Bouchitey now married to the girlfriend goes to view an apartment, and Dewaere turns out to be the agent showing it to them. Roles get reversed as Bouchitey now has the upper hand and Dewaere dependent on the sale. Its both engrossing and pleasent. Dewaere always seemed to be in the shadow of Depardieu, with whom he made several films, including the groundbreaking LES VALSEUSES in 1974 - very dated now with those flared jeans! - where they are the two tearaways on the run who will have sex with anyone - including each other, when no females are around. Jeanne Moreau and Miou Miou are also excellent here. Dewaere though committed suicide with a gun in 1982, that year that Romy Schneider, Ingrid Bergman and Grace Kelly also died.