A small-town detective searching for a missing man has only one lead: a connection with a New York prostitute.
Six months after the disappearance of Tuscarora, PA businessman Tom Gruneman, his boss, Peter Cable, and his wife, Holly Gruneman, hire Tom's friend, private detective John Klute to find out what happened to Tom, as the police have been unable to do so, and despite John having no expertise in missing persons cases. The only lead is a typewritten obscene letter Tom purportedly wrote to Manhattan actress/model/call girl Bree Daniel, who admits to having received such letters from someone, and since having received several mysterious telephone calls as well. The suggestion/belief is that Tom was one of Bree's past johns, although she has no recollection of him when shown his photograph. Bree's tricking is both a compulsion and a financial need. In their initial encounters, John and Bree do whatever they can to exert their psychological dominance over the other, especially as Bree initially refused to even speak to him. Despite their less than friendly start, they embark on a personal relationship based on emotional need, but it is a relationship Bree tries to sabotage because of those same issues which causes her to turn tricks. As they follow the leads through Bree's call girl world, they know they're getting close to finding the truth when someone continues to torment Bree. They believe the key to Tom's disappearance is a violent john who tried to kill her a few years earlier when Tom disappeared but who she doesn't remember. The questions become whether John and Bree can discover his identity and stop him before he tries to kill Bree again, and whether there is a future for them together.—Huggo
John Klute's friend has totally disappeared. The only clue is a connection with a New York call girl, Bree Daniels. Klute taps her phone in order to gain leverage to blackmail her into helping him find his friend. While Klute searches for his missing friend someone is stalking Bree.—John Vogel <[email protected]>
When his old friend, the laboratory engineer Tom Gruneman, vanishes, detective John Klute is hired by Tom's colleague Peter Cable to search for him. The unique lead is an obscene letter allegedly written by Tom to a call-girl in New York called Bree Daniels, and Klute moves to the Big Apple to investigate the disappearance of Tom. Klute blackmails Bree to help him to find other prostitutes that might have information using some tapes of her phone calls that he had secretly recorded. They realize that someone is stalking Bree, while Klute falls in love for Bree and she has some sort of feeling that she can not understand for him.—Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
After a businessman disappears the police draw a blank except for a dirty letter found in his desk written to a New York call-girl. His small-town friend John Klute travels to the big city to seek her out. At first their relationship is wary, and she sees him as just another guy to manipulate. But someone seems to be stalking her, and Klute's activities add to the danger as a bond of sorts starts to grow between the couple.—Jeremy Perkins {J-26}
Bree Daniels (Jane Fonda) is a prostitute in New York City who aspires to be a model/actress. Along with Jane McKenna and Arlyn Page, she used to work for pimp Frank Ligourin (Roy Scheider). Bree quits working full-time as a prostitute after a serious encounter with a violent customer.
The movie opens with Tom Gruneman and his wife hosting a social gathering at their house in Tuscarora, Pennsylvania. Their guests include Tom's colleague Peter Cable (Charles Cioffi) and Tom's friend/policeman John Klute (Donald Sutherland).
Soon after, Tom Gruneman disappears without a trace and the police perform an investigation. They find an obscene letter to Bree Daniels at Gruneman's office in his desk. Daniels is contacted and she confirms that she had received several such letters but does not recognize Tom when shown a photograph. Daniels is arrested for prostitution. When released, she severs her relationship with Ligourin and begins to freelance and make her own contacts with customers. She leaves Park Avenue and moves into a small apartment and begins to worry that someone is following her.
After six months of investigating Tom Gruneman's disappearance, the Police are at a dead end. Peter Cable hires John Klute to go to New York City and continue the investigation.
Klute moves into a basement apartment in the same building where Daniels lives. He taps her telephone and records her telephone conversations. He then contacts Daniels and asks for her help in solving Gruneman's disappearance. Although initially reluctant, Daniels eventually cooperates with the persistent Klute who provides her protection from whomever is stalking her. Bree tries to manipulate Klute using sex but eventually she actually comes to care for him when he helps her get away from her former pimp.
Klute learns that Jane McKenna (one of Frank Ligourin's former prostitutes at the time Bree was with him) apparently committed suicide. Then Aryln Page, another prostitute from Bree's past, whom Klute tracks down and also fails to recognize Tom's picture, is subsequently found dead.
As Klute's investigation continues, it becomes evident that:(1) The same man mistreated Bree Daniels and the other two prostitutes of Frank Ligourin;(2) The man used Tom Gruneman's name when he was with the prostitutes;(3) The man murdered Jane McKenna and Arlyn Page and probably Tom GrunemanKlute eventually investigates Tom's friends and identifies Peter Cable based on the typewriter used to type the obscene letters and his writing style and consistent typing errors.
The killer is not a mystery to viewers as Peter Cable is shown several times throughout the movie listening to tapes he had recorded of the sexual encounters and murders on a small tape recorder.
/ Replace following paragraph:It is unclear why Cable thought it necessary to try to frame Gruneman (by planting the letter to Daniels in Gruneman's desk) or why Cable hired Klute to continue the investigation when the police had come to a dead end.
/With this:Toward the end of the movie Cable reveals to Bree Daniels that Gruneman had found him with Arlyn Page, which is why Cable thought it necessary to try to frame Gruneman (by planting the letter to Daniels in Gruneman's desk). However, it is a mystery why Cable hired Klute to continue the investigation when the police had come to a dead end, or if Cable had later killed Gruneman.
Cable follows and attempts to kill Daniels, but Klute arrives just in time to save Daniels and Cable falls out the window to his death.(He jumped out the window.)
Daniels moves out of her apartment to go with Klute who she has fallen in love with although she doubts she will be able to convert to a domestic life.
