As with most trends in cinema, it takes a few years for those running behind to catch up, which means American films didn\u2019t really start responding to the Italian giallo in a big way until around the mid- to late-\u201870s. Because of this, the starting point of the American giallo is generally assumed to be around the time of Alice, Sweet Alice<\/em> in 1976. Yet, much like slasher aficionados tend to cite Black Christmas<\/em> or Bay of Blood<\/em> over Halloween<\/em> as the true beginning of that subgenre, the American giallo very likely began with Alan J. Pakula\u2019s Klute<\/em> in 1971. Due to the giallo\u2019s popularity being relatively recent at the time of Klute<\/em>\u2019s release (especially in America), most of the discourse surrounding the film then and now tends to reference its elements of film noir and Hitchcock, along with its emergent feminism and counter-culture ennui. Moreover, there\u2019s the retrospective addition of the movie to Pakula\u2019s thematic \u201cparanoia trilogy,\u201d lumping it in with his post-Watergate conspiracy thrillers The Parallax View<\/em><\/a> and All the President\u2019s Men<\/em>. Clearly, Klute<\/em> is a movie with much more on its mind than being a down-and-dirty genre thriller.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet its thriller and genre elements are undeniable, especially when considered in context with the giallos that preceded and followed it. In Klute<\/em>, the titular detective (Donald Sutherland), a relatively affluent Pennsylvanian, is tasked with finding a missing (wealthy) friend who apparently had ties to a New York City call girl named Bree Daniels (Jane Fonda). Thus, the film is partially about the culture shock and culture clash between the characters\u2019 classes and their respective culture, a trope often seen in the giallos of director Umberto Lenzi. Although Pakula, in conjunction with writers Andy and Dave Lewis, makes a very Hitchcockian choice to reveal the killer to the audience early in the runtime, the first half is still very much a whodunit, as are the majority of giallo films. While this choice pivots the film more toward character study than tawdry thriller, it continues to highlight the killer\u2019s fetishistic and kinky modus operandi: he records the audio of each of his murders, all of whom are call girls. This presages similarly kink-obsessed giallo killers, from the provocative title of Andrea Bianchi\u2019s Strip Nude For Your Killer<\/em> to the murderer of Dario Argento\u2019s Opera<\/em>, who insists on making his ultimate victim watch each of his killings by tying her up and placing needles just beneath her eyes to keep them open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The relationship of sex and death is present in most horror films. The giallo is famous for exploiting the fascination of both states of being, the better to highlight the danger of arousal clouding the rational mind, a danger that threatens both men and women. In Klute<\/em>, not only is the killer\u2019s mind shattered by the disconnect between his public persona and his violently carnal desires, but John Klute\u2019s carefully constructed moral worldview is challenged by the mercurial Bree, who herself is thrown by her growing affection (and attendant repulsion) for Klute. The psychosexual dynamics of the characters not only precedes what would soon become the erotic thriller, but develops the latent themes within Hitchcock\u2019s work that would later be made explicit by filmmakers like Brian De Palma and David Lynch; there\u2019s much of Blue Velvet<\/em>\u2019s Jeffrey and Twin Peaks<\/em>\u2019 Agent Cooper in Klute, for instance. Fonda\u2019s rightfully lauded performance brilliantly demonstrates the conflicts and changes occurring within Bree, but Sutherland\u2019s underrated, understated work as Klute gives Fonda space to shine, and allows John to be both an audience proxy (almost a Greek chorus) and a hopeless dullard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The two most prominent aspects that tie Klute<\/em> to the giallo are its cinematography and score. Klute<\/em> is one of the first films lensed by cinematographer Gordon Willis, whose work in conjunction with Pakula was to make early \u201870s New York suffused with shadows\u2014so much so that each frame of the film appears as if it\u2019s trying to swallow the people within it. This approach not only works with the thematic material and eerie tone, it also clearly influenced Willis when he went to make his one and only directorial effort a decade later, 1980\u2019s Windows<\/em>,<\/a> which contains its own psychosexual giallo-style plot. The score, composed by Michael Small, is as multi-faceted as the film it accompanies, sliding between moody jazz-pop and more atmospheric menace. Most telling is its use of a female vocalist, who crops up singing a breathy \u201cla-la-la\u201d refrain. This motif can be viewed as either the voices of the dead haunting (or alluring) the killer, or as Bree\u2019s own, lone voice amidst a sea of darkness. The choice seems to deliberately echo (or homage) Ennio Morricone\u2019s use of breathy female vocals for his score to Argento\u2019s The Bird With the Crystal Plumage<\/em>, vocals that are similarly ambiguous as to whether they\u2019re erotic moans of pleasure or troubling groans of pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While it\u2019s true that Klute<\/em> doesn\u2019t necessarily revel in its genre trappings, and is certainly much more than an average thriller or giallo, it\u2019s nonetheless a sterling example of the form. There\u2019s a good reason why select scenes turn up in the 1984 clip show-cum-visual essay Terror in the Aisles<\/em>; the movie brilliantly layers themes and emotion in with a large amount of tension and fear, making it both a rich and visceral experience. The giallo was always going to find its way to American shores eventually, and its tropes would\u2019ve undoubtedly influenced our cinema regardless. Yet without Klute<\/em>, it may have taken longer, and perhaps wouldn\u2019t have resulted in so many great films which followed its lead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Klute” is streaming on Tubi<\/a> and Hoopla<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/klute2-1024x575.jpg\")
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