Klute Rating: Release Date: 05 February, 2002 Retail Price: $19.98 OUR Price: $10.97 You SAVE: $9.01! Cast: Jane Fonda Donald Sutherland Roy Scheider Richard B. Shull Complete Cast (13 total)

Klute Reviews

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Dated, but never that good to begin with
Happy to be the contrarian here. Some movies, like, say, The Plot Against Harry, or A Clockwork Orange, are as good today as the day they were made. Some, like Dr. Strangelove, seem a little dated, but still great. But Klute was simply never that good.

The focus, here, unfortunately, is on Jane Fonda's character, a high-class call-girl. Some people seem to love her performance, but to me neither Fonda, nor her character is that compelling. There are long scenes where she talks to her therapist. There are floppy 60's-style dance parties. There is a sleazy pimp played by Roy Scheider. Even Scheider isn't as much of a pleasure as he should be. These are all as unconvincing and dated and unhip as those Mad magazine parodies from the same period. Sort of a tourist view of city sleaze.

Donald Sutherland is the straight-arrow private detective. While he's slightly better, there's not enough of him and too much of Fonda. There's no real suspense, and nothing too convincing about the "chemistry" between Fonda and Sutherland.

Another film that this superficially resembles is The Conversation, by Francis Ford Coppola. The Conversation is a masterpiece and, if anything, has improved with age. There's no real comparison here. Klute is only mildly enjoyable for people who might like the period flavor or are fans of Jane Fonda. 2 1/2 stars.

The kind of dark, character-driven detective story not seen too often anymore
As high as so many 1970's films rank on the all-time best American movies list, many of them- their ultimate quality aside- resisted delivering a story that was too linear or too easily comprehensible, perhaps in fear of being labeled mere entertainment or too commercial... "Three Women" or "Night Moves" anyone? The nice thing about "Klute" is that, although some elements remain ambiguous (not every little detail is explained), in the end you know who was behind everything and the basic mechanics of the plot. Call me old-fashioned but I like that in a movie.

For those who like moody, character-driven detective stories, you really can't go wrong with "Klute", and Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland are excellent. It also doesn't hurt that the film was beautifully photographed, in all his dark and shadowy glory, by Gordon Willis, who went on to fame the following year when he photographed "The Godfather."

The DVD offers a clean, sharp widescreen print of the film, which doesn't betray the movie's age at all. Also included on the DVD is an eight or nine minute promotional film, about the shooting of "Klute" in New York City, that was produced at the same time as the feature film. This short promo film made me smile: its tone was essentially that everyone at the time had thrown in the towel regarding New York's crime, corruption, and filthy streets, and that although the movie's producers were glad to shoot there for authenticity, they were equally glad to get out. I guess I have to give Rudy Guiliani a little credit for eventually cleaning things up.

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