Entertainment
Shocking, R-Rated 70s Thriller Is A Paranoid Descent Into Conspiracy
By Robert Scucci
| Published
When people say “they don’t make thrillers like they used to,” I have full reason to believe they have films like 1971’s Klute in mind when they’re airing their grievances. Sometimes, all you need to tell a compelling story is a missing persons case, a climbing body count, and some good old fashioned police work. Directed by Alan J. Pakula, Klute delivers all of the above in spades, and it’s no surprise that its critical and commercial success kicked off what’s affectionately, and informally, known as the “paranoia trilogy,” which also includes 1974’s The Parallax View and 1976’s All the President’s Men.
Anchored by a tight mystery that never fully reveals its true nature until it reaches a breaking point, Klute is a hard-boiled neo-noir thriller you can really sink your teeth into as you try to put the puzzle pieces together yourself.
Starts With A Missing Person And A Call Girl
When Pennsylvania-based chemical company executive Tom Gruneman (Robert Milli) vanishes without a trace, private investigator John Klute (Donald Sutherland) is summoned to trace his whereabouts. Before committing to the case, he’s briefed on intel provided by Gruneman’s employer and colleague, Peter Cable (Charles Cioffi), so he knows exactly what he’s getting into. The only lead John Klute has to work with involves a New York City call girl named Bree Daniels (Jane Fonda), who has received several obscene letters from Gruneman in the lead-up to his disappearance.
The investigation starts out simply enough, with John secretly renting a basement apartment in Bree’s building so he can surveil her and gather intel. Bree is a tough nut to crack because she genuinely enjoys the independence her career affords her as a high-class call girl between sparsely offered acting and modeling gigs. John knows he’s tailing the right woman, but Bree, given how many johns she’s encountered over the years, only vaguely remembers an encounter with Gruneman, who was said to have laid hands on her.
Bree is at first hesitant to work with John, but when their frequent run-ins result in a budding romance, their motives align and she becomes more willing to cooperate with the investigation. That cooperation leads John to Frank Ligouin (Roy Scheider), Bree’s former pimp. Upon learning about two other call girls, Jane Mckenna and Arlyn Page, who both had similarly troubling encounters with Gruneman, John comes as close as he ever will to locating him, only to realize that Gruneman’s disappearance is merely the tip of the iceberg. There are more parties involved, and they don’t want their dark secrets exposed.
A Straight-Faced Thriller With A Gutpunch Ending
More than 50 years after its initial release, Klute is still as effective as anything coming out today because it doesn’t bother overexplaining what’s truly at stake. Instead, it leaves a breadcrumb trail of clues and morally dubious figures in its wake. John Klute has a job to do, but he also finds himself uncovering a far-reaching conspiracy involving powerful people. There’s ample reason not to trust his client at face value, and Bree’s own paranoia and inability to trust anyone adds a palpable layer of tension as she lets her guard down and allows John to become more than just the private investigator living in her building.
Klute checks all the boxes for a rock-solid crime thriller, and it holds up because it’s a well-written mystery that trusts its audience to do the heavy lifting. It leans hard into neo-noir without relying on gimmicks, melodramatic dialogue, or intrusive narration. Its straight-faced delivery is what ultimately pulls you in as you zero in on the guilty parties involved. And if you like what you see here, there’s plenty more where that came from with its unofficial companions, The Parallax View and All the President’s Men.
As of this writing, Klute is streaming for free on Tubi.
Entertainment
The best early Big Spring Sale deals at Amazon include record-low prices on portable power stations
Table of Contents
Best early Amazon Big Spring Sale portable power stations deals at a glance
Amazon saw the sun setting later, smelled flowers blooming, and felt warmer temps and decided to celebrate. The Amazon Big Spring Sale is slated to kick off tomorrow, March 25, with big discounts. That’s proving to be great news if you’re in the market for a portable power station.
A portable power station has become a must-have tech item. It’s like your favorite noise-cancelling earbuds — no idea how we survived without them. A portable power station will be a savior during power outages, keeping the refrigerator running, phones charged up, and the WiFi router giving off a connection. A portable power station is also well worth packing along on upcoming camping trips. Think of movie nights under the stars thanks to a powered-up portable projector and with fresh popcorn.
The one snag here is that batteries aren’t cheap, and that’s especially true of high-tech and long-lasting batteries found in portable power stations. Because of this, shopping for a power station during major sales like the Amazon Big Spring Sale is a wise move. Here are some of our favorite models that are already seeing steep discounts before the sale officially begins.
Best Bluetti deal
$394.98
at Amazon
$799
Save $404.02
Why we like it
If you’re hoping to keep phones and small devices charged up during a power outage or while camping, the Bluetti Elite 100 V2 comes with 1,024Wh of battery power. Bluetti mentions this battery power will recharge a phone about 52 times or keep the WiFi router on for nearly 50 hours. Its compact size and weight of about 25 pounds makes it especially easy to pack along on the camping trip or carry around the house during a power outage.
The early Amazon Big Spring Sale price brings the Bluetti Elite 100 V2 down to $399, which is a 50% discount compared to its list price of $799.
Mashable Deals
More Bluetti deals
Best Anker Solix deal
$4,399
at Amazon
$7,397
Save $2,998
The massive Anker Solix F3800 is ideal for home backup should the power cut out. On its own, the Solix F3800 comes with 3,8400 Wh of battery capacity to keep your tech running without grid power, but Anker made this deal even better ahead of Amazon’s Big Spring Sale. The Solix F3800 comes bundled with BP3800 Expansion Battery and a 400W solar panel. The extra battery brings the total capacity up to 7,680Wh while the addition of a solar panels puts you in line for recharging off-grid.
More Anker Solix deals
Best Jackery deal
$429
at Amazon
$799
Save $370
Why we like it
If you’re looking for a portable power station to take along to the campground this summer, the Jackery Explorer 100 V2 is an ideal model. It’s a mix of portability, durability, solid port options, and it’s on sale for under $430. This Jackery model comes with 1,070Wh for recharging your phones while camping, keeping the speaker ready to go, and powering up the projector for movie nights. Plus, it weighs under 24 pounds, so you won’t have to struggle lugging it around camp.
More Jackery deals
More portable power stations on sale at Amazon
Topics
Outdoors
Amazon Big Spring Sale
Entertainment
Ads may be coming to Apple Maps as soon as this summer, report says
Apple Maps might get a fairly big change soon, and it’s one that few people will be excited about.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported this week that Apple will put advertisements in the Maps app on iPhone this summer, with an initial announcement as early as this month. Rather than bombarding users with annoying pop-up ads, it sounds like it’ll be more of a “sponsored search results” sort of thing, so you might see an ad for a specific restaurant or Uber Eats as part of a search query, even when that’s not exactly what you were looking for.
This idea also came up in a report last year, but it sounds like it’s actually happening soon. According to Gurman, the Apple Maps ads would operate similar to ads on Google Maps, with advertisers bidding on search terms like “coffee” or “thai food.”
Mashable Light Speed
Nobody likes it when a previously ad-free app gets ads, but in complete fairness to all involved, Google Maps has had sponsored search results for years, and that hasn’t stopped it from becoming the go-to navigation app. Users will put up with fairly non-intrusive ads as long as the app does its job, which has sometimes been a problem for Apple Maps over the years.
Despite all of that, though, the reception to the idea on social media has been pretty cold. Frosty, in fact.
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Perhaps people are just tired of constantly being advertised to in every part of their lives.
One reason iOS users might be angry? Apple is already reporting record sales in 2026, with Tim Cook calling the demand for iPhones “simply staggering.”
Topics
Apple
Apps & Software
Entertainment
20 noise-cancelling headphones and earbuds deals live ahead of Amazons Big Spring Sale
Best noise-cancelling headphones deals ahead of the Big Spring Sale
If spring is the season of cleaning and rebirth, why can’t that include your old, half-functioning noise-cancelling headphones barely hanging on to half their original battery life?
While Black Friday and Prime Day are generally great times of year to pick up a new pair of headphones, that doesn’t mean you’re left high and dry in the spring, especially thanks to Amazon’s Big Spring Sale.
The sitewide sale starts for its third year running on March 25 and goes all the way through March 31. Prime and non-Prime members alike can enjoy savings, and while this sale is more focused on season-appropriate savings like outdoor gear, home essentials, and cleaning supplies, historically we’ve also seen great deals on tech like noise-cancelling headphones.
Amazon’s Big Spring Sale kicks off on March 25 this year. Here’s how we’re prepping for it.
The Spring Sale isn’t necessarily Black Friday-level, so some early deals are just as good as what you’ll see live during the sale. With that in mind, we gathered 20 of the best noise-cancelling headphones and earbuds deal live ahead of the sale:
Note: any deals with a strike are no longer available at the time of writing.
Best noise-cancelling headphones on sale
$398
at Amazon
$459.99
Save $61.99
Why we like it
Sony’s flagship WH-1000XM6 headphones may not be the cheapest out there, even on sale for $61.99 off. Still, they’re some of the best headphones out there, and certainly one of the best sounding ones, with a great equalizer for fine tuning your listening experience. Add with their solid battery life, excellent ANC, and folding ear cups for some travel portability, and you have some well-rounded headphones. If you’re looking for a cheaper option, we recommend the Sony WH-CH720N.
Check out our full review of the Sony WH-1000XM6.
Mashable Deals
More early noise cancelling headphones deals
Best noise-cancelling earbuds on sale
$88
at Amazon
$129.99
Save $41.99
Why we like it
While there are plenty of great noise-cancelling earbuds out there, not all of them can claim to offer a performance that beats that AirPods 4 while costing less than $100. With the Sony WF-C710N on sale for $88, that’s exactly the case. While this isn’t the absolute lowest price we’ve caught these earbuds at (that would be $69.99), you’ll still save an impressive 32% on them. And, you’ll get a pair of earbuds with solid ANC, a comfortable enough fit for at least a few hours of continuous wear, easy to use touch controls, classic well-rounded Sony sound, and 8.5 hours of battery life per charge.
Check out our full review of the Sony WH-C710N.
More early noise-cancelling earbuds deals
The best early Big Spring Sale deals at Amazon include record-low prices on portable power stations
Ads may be coming to Apple Maps as soon as this summer, report says
