Like most detective movies, Klute is a tale of murder, sex, lies and deceit. Similar to most neo-noir of the time frame, Klute centralizes on the gritty underbelly of society as it brings the ladies of the night into broad daylight. While tapping into themes of drug use, adultery, passion and sadism, Klute successfully manages to imbue the seedy and perverse nature of 1970s New York, setting the perfect stage for a play of morality, hypocrisy and murder. The initial plot revolves around the disappearance of Tom Gruneman, a small town business and family man and his friend, detective John Klute’s, hunt to find him. However, as one watches on, the realization that the seemingly separate and layered subplots begin to unfold into a more complex and frightening mystery that has everything, yet at the exact same time, nothing to do with the disappearance of Gruneman. According to theorist D.A Miller, detective fiction is encapsulated in the investigation of the crime, not the preliminary crime itself. With this in mind, it becomes clear as to how the plots involving Gruneman, Bree Klute and Cable all contribute to make Klute a movie about quest rather than resolve. Primarily, the pursuit of Gruneman is what forces small town detective John Klute to New York. Early on in the film, it is revealed that explicit letters link Gruneman, a paradigm of American virtue, to a disreputable prostitute named Bree Daniels. Following Miller’s claim that, “No detail can be dismissed as a priori” Klute begins a rather throughout investigation of Bree’s life (33). From tapping her phone line to watching her conduct her ‘business’, Klute’s almost obsessive surveillance of Bree’s life is what triggers the plot for a more multifaceted mystery that affects the lives of almost everyone Bree has come in contact with. Once Klute realizes Bree is a victim and not a suspect, the x-rated phone calls he originally uses as leverage (and believes to be evidence) is dismissed, literally thrown away and deemed unimportant. As Miller describes, “Sinister objects recover their banality, just as secret objects resume their inconsequence” (33). Now, with Bree as his guide into the derelict and abysmally treacherous jungle that is New York, both begin a mission to resolve the case, working off each other’s strengths and weaknesses, experience and knowledge. With Bree at his side, Klute manages to unravel a conspiracy so entrenched in subterfuge and mystery, that it manages to breach all socio-economic spheres of New York life. Pimps, drug dealers, prostitutes, wealthy businessmen, junkies and detectives all become interlaced in the compelling plotline that is Klute. Furthermore, Bree’s journey becomes one of unwanted surveillance. Miller goes on to explicate how there is an innate guilty/innocent sentiment that is a key building block on the path to discovery (34). By stating how, “The truth shall make you free,” Miller argues that once and only once a character has revealed the secrets they are hiding, can they be cleared of all suspicion (34). In Klute, Bree is only deemed innocent after Klute extensively observes her, regardless of the fact she is being harassed. Now, the initial investigation, the quest for Gruneman becomes obsolete as Klute devotes his time and energy to protecting Bree and discovering who is trying to kill her. Klute’s impassive eyes and ears monitor her perpetually, under both guises of protecting or scrutinize her. Yet, what makes this inspection notable, according to Miller, is that the freedom from surveillance is more than just a “freedom from criminal guilt” (36). Bree is only capable of assisting Klute once she is no longer monitored. With her innocence proven, Bree becomes a pivotal partner in Klute’s investigation, and he successfully manages to interpellates Bree into the elite group of watchers, the surveyors instead of the surveyed. With surveillance no longer solely in the hands of the detective, Klute alludes to the schism between innocent until proven guilty and guilty until proven innocent. Also, Klute himself falls into Miller’s dissection of detective novels. Although he himself does not possess what Miller has dubbed ‘super-vision’, Klute’s monotone, apathetic demeanor and cool, calculating work ethic enable both he and Bree to solve the murders. Klute is no Sherlock Holmes; he does not possess the ability to dismiss “the ordinary, ‘trivial’ facts of everyday life” (35). In fact, Klute’s inability to quickly remedy the mystery is what leads both he and Bree on the adventure that proves both deadly and enlightening. Though, as Miller affirms, “[the detective’s] intervention marks an explicit bringing-under-surveillance of the entire world of the narrative” (35). Klute, most certainly brings surveillance to Bree’s world while examining her life with his critical eye. Yet it is Klute’s rigid and detached manner of investigation that leads Bree to take matters into her own hands, prompting her back to the life of drugs and lewd sexual behavior. While Bree is out do-ing, Klute remains constant in his quiet investigation, collecting every bit of evidence, pack-ratting them until the very end when the proverbial veil is lifted from his eyes and the pertinent evidence stands out like a neon sign in a dingy alley. Nonetheless, what makes Klute an interesting case, is that the criminal mastermind, Peter Cable, is revealed to the audience rather early on in the narrative, rendering Klute and Bree’s journey a quest to catch up with the audience, rather than the culprit. Gruneman’s disappearance, the murder of Arlyn and Bree’s harassment and assault are all solved once Cable’s ominous figure stands looming out a window, half hidden in shadows as he replays the tape of Bree condoning his sexual sadism. Moreover, Miller asserts, “Thought the detective story postulates a world in which everything might have a meaningful bearing on the solution of the crime, it concludes with an extensive repudiation of meanings that simply ‘drop out’” (34). The viewers are now the ones that are able to decipher which bits and pieces of evidence are relevant or not, instantaneously letting the useless objects “relapse into insignificance” (34). Though, what keeps Klute exciting and irreverent is that by guaranteeing, “large areas of irrelevance”, the viewers partake in the hunt, thus becoming mentally and emotionally tied to the characters (34). Also, now that Klute and Bree's expedition is to catch up with the audience, the position of the audience is now that of a backseat driver, one where the final destination no longer matters, but the twists and turns the road inhibits the characters with. The hunters become the hunted as Klute and Bree become targets in their investigation and their urgency to discover the criminal stems from a the biological flight/flight response instead of the primary: curiosity and justice. The audience is privy to their budding romance, their tumultuous attraction and the countless dead ends and false leads that make Klute so entertaining and suspenseful to witness. In conclusion, Klute is a movie that is more about the path to victory than the actual victory. Whether it is seen in Gruneman, Bree, Klute or Cable, the implementation of the notion of journeys, quests, hunts, searches or pursuits is repeated and carried through the entire film. Miller’s deductions concerning investigations, guilt, surveillance and ‘super-vision’ all contribute to Klute making it a movie that is both comforting and frightening, all in the same instant.