Many of Shane Black’s scripts have become cult classics, including The Monster Squad (1987), The Last Boy Scout (1991), Last Action Hero (1993), his 2005 neo-noir classic Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (also his directorial debut), and my favorite Shane Black film to date, The Nice Guys (2016). It’s largely because his films have a distinctive personality, combining dysfunctional characters, sharp dialogue, irreverent humor, genre-blending plots, memorable buddy dynamics, and tremendous rewatchability—qualities that have helped many of them develop devoted cult followings over time.
The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996), written by Shane Black and directed by Renny Harlin, is another perfect cult classic. It came with huge expectations after Black became Hollywood’s highest-paid screenwriter, reportedly receiving a then-record $4 million for the script, only to underperform at the box office. That almost feels strange now, because the movie is so easy to fall in love with. Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson have fantastic chemistry, the action is gloriously excessive, and Harlin gives everything a propulsive 1990s energy. It’s the kind of ridiculous, endlessly entertaining action movie that gets more fun every time you revisit it.
Samantha Caine (Geena Davis) lives in the small town of Honesdale, Pennsylvania, with her daughter Caitlin and boyfriend Hal, and works as a schoolteacher. She was discovered on the Jersey Shore eight years ago, pregnant and injured, and since then, she has had no memory of her life before then. However, after suffering a slight head injury, she begins to recollect parts of her prior existence. Trying to recover the life she can’t remember, Samantha hires Mitch (Samuel L. Jackson) to investigate her past. What begins as a search for answers soon spirals into something far more dangerous, as the two become entangled in a world of assassins, cover-ups, and intelligence operations neither of them saw coming.
The film’s plot feels loosely inspired by Robert Ludlum’s 1980 novel The Bourne Identity, in which a spy loses his memory during an assignment and tries to piece together his past and his links to a clandestine government agency. What keeps viewers coming back to The Long Kiss Goodnight is how the plot unfolds through a continuous stream of revelations, most of them tied to Samantha’s buried past—her identity as a CIA assassin, the nature of her final job, and the people who want her gone. By the end of the second act, the film has established the villains, their plan, and their motivations, so the third act becomes a race against time to stop them, with Mitch and Catherine being the only ones positioned (and motivated) to do so. Furthermore, having Samantha’s daughter caught up in the danger personalizes the stakes, giving the film’s climax an emotional weight.
Shane Black has a lot of fun with Chekhov’s gun here, planting little details that seem almost throwaway at first and then bringing them back when you least expect it. Waldman (Brian Cox), Samantha’s former psychiatrist, mentions a hidden gun in passing that turns out to be a valuable detail when Samantha needs to use it; her sudden, unexplained knife skills initially seem like an odd quirk of the character but prove vital in the fight scenes; the suitcase yields both vital information and a sniper rifle that Samantha knows how to assemble and use instinctively. None of these details feel like accidents, which is what makes the payoffs so satisfying.
Layered on top of this is the strong character interplay between Samantha and Mitch, which keeps the film lively and provides consistent comic relief even amid the violence. The more time you spend with Samantha and Mitch, the more you enjoy their company. The rapid-fire banter and Samuel L. Jackson’s endless supply of great one-liners give the film much of its charm, but what really sells it is how naturally the two play off each other. There is no forced chemistry here; they just click. Geena Davis does a great job with the role’s physical demands, selling the transition from housewife to assassin while not losing the sincerity of Samantha’s love for her daughter. And then there’s Jackson, who is simply a joy to watch. His performance makes Mitch cynical, foul-mouthed, and unexpectedly vulnerable. Nobody in Hollywood can match Jackson’s dialogue delivery. Give the man the flattest dialogue imaginable, and he’ll still make it captivating. That’s just how good he is.
But one of my big problems with The Long Kiss Goodnight is that Samantha’s personality shift is very abrupt after she learns her true identity as Charly. Her shift back into her former assassin persona feels less like a gradual regaining of her buried self and more like flipping a switch. Her transformation is so extreme that it seemingly suppresses the maternal attachment to her daughter, culminating in her willingness to abandon her. That doesn’t feel like a convincing evolution of the same character; it feels as though the screenplay treats Samantha and Charly as two almost entirely separate personalities. Also, her unexpected sexual overtures toward Mitch feel awkward and out of place, disrupting the wonderfully hilarious buddy-comedy dynamic between the duo.
When it comes to action, the film has everything you could ask for: shootouts, car chases, explosions, a water-wheel escape, and an explosive final bridge sequence. But the action’s execution is a mixed bag. The kitchen fight is clever and energetic, the train station sequence is a blast, and I love the frozen-lake set piece where Samantha and Mitch leap from a building while Samantha shoots the ice below them, sending them plunging through it and into the water. Unfortunately, some of the special effects haven’t held up, especially during the finale, which looks noticeably dated today. So, while the action is good fun, there are no remarkable, unique, or distinctive set pieces to brag about.
Over the years, The Long Kiss Goodnight has become the ultimate crowd-pleaser: delightfully over-the-top, unabashedly absurd, and a must-see for aficionados of 1990s action movies like myself.
The Long Kiss Goodnight Movie Links: IMDb, Letterboxd, Wikipedia
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