The Long Kiss Goodnight movie storyline. Samantha Caine, suburban homemaker, is the ideal mom to her 8 year old daughter Caitlin. She lives in Honesdale, PA, has a job teaching school and makes the best Rice Krispie treats in town. But when she receives a bump on her head, she begins to remember small parts of her previous life as a lethal, top-secret agent.
Her old chums in the Chapter are now out to kill her so she enlists the help of a cheap detective named Mitch. As Samantha remembers more and more of her previous life, she becomes deadlier and more resourceful. Both Mitch and Charly proceed to do the killing thing, the bleeding thing and the shooting thing.
The Long Kiss Goodnight is a 1996 American neo noir action film directed and produced by Renny Harlin, written and produced by Shane Black and starring Geena Davis, Samuel L. Jackson, Yvonne Zima, Patrick Malahide, Craig Bierko, Brian Cox, David Morse, Tom Amandes, Melina Kanakaredes and Jennifer Pisana.
About the Story
Samantha Caine (Geena Davis) is a schoolteacher in the small town of Honesdale, Pennsylvania, with her boyfriend Hal (Tom Amandes) and her daughter Caitlin (Yvonne Zima). Eight years earlier, she was found washed ashore on a New Jersey beach, pregnant with Caitlin and totally amnesiac. Having never remembered her real name or any part of her life from before that day, “Samantha” has hired a number of private investigators to try to discover her past, the latest being Mitch Henessey (Samuel L. Jackson).
During the Christmas holidays, Samantha is involved in a car accident and suffers a brief concussion, and when she recovers, she finds that she possesses skills with a knife that she cannot explain. Some time later, they are attacked by “One-Eyed Jack” (Joseph McKenna), a convict who escaped from jail after seeing Samantha’s face on television, but she demonstrates the prowess to subdue and kill Jack bare-handed. Worried that she may scare Caitlin, Samantha leaves with Mitch, who has been able to find a suitcase purportedly belonging to her, to seek out answers.
The suitcase contains a note directing the two to Dr. Nathan Waldman (Brian Cox), who they arrange to meet at a train station, unaware that unknown agents are tracing the doctor’s calls. En route, Samantha discovers the bottom of the suitcase contains a disassembled sniper rifle which she can expertly reassemble, along with other weapons.
At the station, Samantha and Mitch go to meet Dr. Waldman and are attacked by a number of agents, but the two manage to escape with Nathan’s help. The doctor reveals that he knows Samantha is really an expert CIA assassin, Charlene Elizabeth “Charly” Baltimore, who had disappeared eight years prior.
Unsure if they can trust him, (due to the surprise attack they’d just escaped, and him being the only person they’d contacted), Samantha and Mitch leave Waldman behind and seek another contact named on a note within the suitcase, Luke (David Morse), believing him to be Samantha’s fiancé.
Waldman catches up, trying to warn them of something, and they realize too late that Luke was actually Samantha’s last assassination target, “Daedalus”; Luke kills Dr. Waldman and captures and tortures Samantha (has her strapped to a large water-wheel to enquire why she’s resurfaced after all these years), whilst repeatedly held underwater she’s finally jolted into remembering her past life.
The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)
Directed by: Renny Harlin
Starring: Geena Davis, Samuel L. Jackson, Yvonne Zima, Patrick Malahide, Craig Bierko, Brian Cox, David Morse, Tom Amandes, Melina Kanakaredes, Jennifer Pisana
Screenplay by: Shane Black
Production Design by: Howard Cummings
Cinematography by: Guillermo Navarro
Film Editing by: William Goldenberg
Costume Design by: Michael Kaplan
Set Decoration by: Michael Taylor
Art Direction by: Steve Arnold, Dennis Davenport
Music by: Alan Silvestri
MPAA Rating: R for a substantial amount of strong bloody violence, and for strong language.
Distributed by: New Line Cinema
Release Date: October 11, 1996
Hits: 120
