Monday, March 19, 2018

Top 50 Actresses, #6 - Jane Fonda: "Klute" (1971)

Movie Stats:
Released 1971 (USA)
American, in English (minor, non-translated French)
Director - Alan J. Pakula
Stars - Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland

Plot Summary:
Six months after the disappearance of his best friend, John Klute (Sutherland) is hired by the man’s wife to find him. The only lead is Bree Daniels (Fonda), a New York City prostitute.

Warnings:
Sexy times; brief female nudity (breasts only); blue language; drug use (marijuana); violence.

Bad Stuff:
The pace is very slow.

As a character, John Klute is an odd duck. The whole film, he showed almost no emotion. It’s like things happened around him while he simply existed.

I didn’t care for the repetitive use of the audio tape. It got annoying after a while, like, I get it, I heard it 5 times already.

Good Stuff:
I like how it portrayed Bree as a real person with a real life. She has career aspirations (actress/model), she talks to a therapist, her life is a bit lonely. She’s complex and flawed. While I sometimes found it a bit unrealistic, it was a nice change from how prostitutes are normally portrayed.

Fonda is excellent.

It features good, old-fashioned detective work. Klute solves the case through tenacity, determination, and hard work.

About the Performance:
As stated above, I think Fonda is phenomenal in this. In spite of the title, this is really her movie. She’s the main focus, and she carries most of the scenes, whether or not someone else is in them. Bree isn’t an easy person to understand, but Fonda makes her both likable and relatable. I was always rooting for her, even when, by her own admission, she was trying to sabotage things. Fonda really impressed.

Other performances of Fonda’s I’ve reviewed: Barbarella.

The Verdict:
I definitely liked it better than I thought I would. Since it’s a 70s movie, I was prepared to grit my teeth and bear it, but it didn’t annoy me in the way that 70s movies usually do. However, it did have the one fatal flaw I find in all 70s films: slow pacing. Holy cow! When it started, I was really into it. And then it seemed to just drag on and on and on, pulling itself down from a 4-star review into the 3s. I don’t think Sutherland was bad; I think he played the character the way he was supposed to, and I didn’t like the character. Fonda is the bright shining star. I also admire the film for making a prostitute a real, relatable person and for broaching topics that aren’t usually broached with sensitivity and openness. Also, I thought the mystery was pretty good.

I give it 3.5 stars.

2 comments:

Patricia said...

This is one of those movies that I always saw at the video store, but I never watched. It sounds good.

Unlike the Vietnam Vets, I'm rather fonda Jane. Scrolling back through her IMDB list I see I've liked her in movies filmed over many different decades.

balyien said...

I like Fonda well enough myself. A couple of weeks ago, I met someone who expressed a great deal of anger about how Vietnam Vets were treated when they returned from the war (I concur they were treated terribly). It was a good reminder that some people have very long memories/can never forgive a wrong.