Klute: Vertigo and Terror

           The success of Alan Pakula’s Klute as a neo-noir is only partially due to its narrative; rather, it is Klute’s cinematography that is so captivating and simultaneously nauseating.  Pakula uses long shots, odd zooms and angles, provocative mise-en-scene, and stark transitions; all of which is topped off by menacing sound effects and a stomach-turning score.  Ultimately, the viewer is left alienated and disturbed predominantly by this efficacious cinematography.

            The viewer immediately has a sense for the direction of this film as the first shot of a festive, populated dinner abruptly transitions to the same room, but now it is empty and only occupied by police interrogators.  Then the credits roll with just the eerie sounds of a surveillance tape, playing what seems to be a sexual encounter, to accompany them.  We then meet the voice on the tape: Bree Daniels.

            Pakula introduces Bree similarly to the way an architect uses marsch(sp?) to fluidly guide the individuals in his or her respective building from large to small and vice versa.  However, Pakula uses extreme depictions of large and small to jar the viewer’s perspective rather than comfortably guide it.  First, we find Bree on the streets of Manhattan dwarfed by skyscrapers and immense columns.  Then, we are thrown into Bree’s claustrophobic, baroquely ornamented apartment.  At this point, Pakula introduces the motif of the obtrusive and visceral ringing telephone of which the only sound heard on the other end is breathing.  The petrifying score plays and the camera dreadfully slowly zooms out while we watch Bree sit terrified and alone in her bed. 

Bree Daniels in her ornate apartment. This specific shot echoes elements of classical film noir with its chiaroscuro contrast.

            On top of these more subtle cinematographic efforts which persistently estrange the viewer are the more violently innovative and impressive shots.  In these shots we usually find Peter Kable as the character in focus.  There are two shots of this ilk that are particularly vertiginous and disorienting.  The first is the shot of Peter Kable on the top floor of the Marine Midland Building in Lower Manhattan.  The camera displays Peter Kable gazing out of his dark window down into the city.  The camera then zooms out slightly and thrusts downward revealing his position on the top floor and the mystifying height of the building which he occupies.  The second vertiginous shot is when Peter Kable takes off in his helicopter.  After John Klute informs Kable that he needs $500 to purchase Jane McKenna’s black book, Kable boards his helicopter and menacingly gazes out of its windows.  It appears that the camera was strapped onto the left ski of the helicopter which produces a dizzying view of lower Manhattan in the background.  It appears that as Peter Kable is progressively unveiled as the voyeur and murderer the shots of him grow more and more obscure and disturbing. 

The Marine Midland Building of which Peter Kable stands atop.

The madman takes flight.

                                           

            It is this combination of subtle, consistent cinematography juxtaposed with robust and alarming shots that provide the fruit of this film.  It also turns out to be very appropriate for the story itself which forces a small town detective into “the sin, the glitter, the wickedness” of monolithic Manhattan.