Au revoir à jamais

Well, sitting down to watch the 1996 movie "The Long Kiss Goodnight" for the third or fourth time since it was originally released, I have to say that director Renny Harlin's movie is every bit as enjoyable and entertaining today as it was back in the day.

The storyline written by Shane Black is very enjoyable, and it is one that immediately draws in the audience and takes the audience along on an action-packed ride throughout a very nicely constructed, written and told plot and storyline. And this makes "The Long Kiss Goodnight" a very watchable movie.

And also the cast ensemble in "The Long Kiss Goodnight" makes the movie all the more enjoyable. I mean, you have Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson in the leading roles, and they carry this movie phenomenally together. And the movie also have the likes of Brian Cox, David Morse and Craig Bierko on the cast list as well.

The pacing of the narrative throughout the movie is good and rather nicely paced, and the storyline has that quality to it which makes it a movie that you can watch multiple times, and the movie keeps being as enjoyable with each viewing. I will actually say that this is definitely one of the more memorable movies of the mid-1990s.

If you haven't already seen "The Long Kiss Goodnight", then you most certainly should do so, should you find yourself with the opportunity to do so.

My rating of "The Long Kiss Goodnight" lands on a seven out of ten stars.

Before Jason Bourne was an assassin who lost his memory there was Charlie Baltimore and she has no sequels. The way I see it, Geena Davis was ahead of her time. Yes, we'd had "La Femme Nikita" and maybe a few others, but "The Long Kiss Goodnight" was the first female kickass assassin movie I'd ever seen.

This movie went for a tandem that hadn't quite been explored: White female with Black male. I think it worked fabulously. Samuel Jackson pretty much reprised his same role in "Die Hard with a Vengeance." In there he was the reluctant and very funny sidekick. In TLKG he was pretty much the same: a low-rent private eye who was thrust into the middle of a federal game of kill or be killed.

Geena Davis, as Charlene "Charlie" Baltimore was perfect if not for her known character types. She'd always played a fragile motherly type: "The Fly," "Beetlejuice," and "Thelma & Louise" are a few examples. So she fit nicely as a spy who'd lost her memory and wound up being a small town matriarch known for her cookies and clean life. Then to see her flip and become this foul mouth, unbreakable, vicious assassin was awesome.

My only question is where is "The Long Kiss Goodnight 2"? Worse spy/assassin movies have been given sequels so why not give Charlie Baltimore a franchise?

A lot of 'The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)' is decidedly silly, especially when it comes to its over-the-top, tonally jarring and generally just outright ridiculous action sequences. The heroes are essentially indestructible, despite the heavy beating they both endure by the film's end, to the point that it becomes quite ludicrous they'd survive the events they do (indeed, the original script was much darker and even included a major death, which was shot but recut because of audience testing). However, there's generally a knowing vibe the the flick, one that's marked by Shane Black's signature witty banter and some almost ostentatious performances, and this allows the picture to remain fun regardless of its occasional tonal issues, its cartoonish action scenes and all its unkept mayhem (seriously, the flick has quite the body-count). It has an almost satirical feel that's compounded by the several scenery-chewing monologues, tried-and-tested genre cues and people who refer to themselves as spies with a straight face. 6/10

Not a box office success; no-one really knows why. It may have failed simply because of its title. It looks as though you need a two-word tough-guy title to attract a sufficient proportion of the idiot crowd - "Die Hard", "Lethal Weapon", "Hard Weapon", "Die Lethal", etc. - talking about "the long kiss goodnight" will get you nowhere. But for once Renny Harlin has made a GOOD action movie. A large part of the reason for this lies in the fact that the central character, Samantha, earns our affection and interest early on. As she becomes Charly again, we're torn: we certainly want Charly to thwart the bad guys, and all that; but we don't want her to lose touch with Samantha in order to do so - even though we like Charly, too. Geena Davis bestows all of her considerable charm on both halves of the central character. Samuel L. Jackson plays second fiddle for a change. It turns out he's good at it. That was a compliment.

Intelligent, far superior to anything in the "Die Hard" series - if I were more cynical I'd add, "it's not surprising that it didn't do well", but I don't really feel that way; it IS surprising that it didn't do well.

I have always liked a good action movie with a woman lead, Linda Hamilton comes to mind in the Terminator series, of course Sigourney Weaver in the Alien series, and Laura Linney in The Congo,(another one of the Micheal Crichton renditions) was an excellent strong female in an action movie. But none can even come close to Geena Davis in "The Long Kiss Goodnight". She quite simply blew me away ( as well as an incredible amount of bad guys) with the way she "handled her business" in this flick. I gotta tell ya- I will love this woman forever as the result of scenes from this movie-like when jumping from what? six-seven flights up, simultaneously firing an automatic weapon in a circular pattern in order to break a hole through a frozen lake surface-at the same time dragging an incredulous Sam Jackson out the window with her. Yo, this woman, this movie is the Boom Diggie!! I could probably go on extolling this movie for at least 25 to 30 thousand words, but you know, I'd rather look at this movie than write about it, so I'm off. My advice to you is go rent Stuart Little, in case you're one of those weirdos that don't have your own personal copy at home, then follow it up with Cutthroat Island and then finish your evening with "Long Kiss Goodnight" and I guarantee you it will take every bit of will you've got in ya to keep from stalking this woman-not to mention I only found out today she was born on the exact same date as my own, 1/21/56-an Aquarius on top of everything. (Getting a little weird on ya but I had to find some way to throw that in)Don't worry Geena I am happily married with a houseful of happy Geena fans at home right now watching Mr Little! To anyone who hasn't had the pleasure, get out there and rent this film today- you will not be disappointed-to say the least! Finally-you match up Arnold vs Geena based on this movie-and you gotta go with Geena Davis-hands down- This babe is bad!This flick is sweet!