Film

The Long Kiss Goodnight

A Shane Black script wearing a Christmas jumper: Geena Davis's suburban mom discovers she's actually a rogue CIA killer, and the film gleefully lets both halves of that sentence be true at once. It's violent, filthy-mouthed, and structured like a firework display — but Davis's physical commitment and her prickly chemistry with Samuel L. Jackson keep it from ever feeling like just noise.

TMDb rating6.6

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True Lies1994

Same DNA: a spouse's secret double life exploding into enormous set pieces, played with a wink throughout. Cameron-scale spectacle with genuine laughs baked into the carnage.

But Arnold's action-comedy persona and some of the marital 'jokes' have aged in ways that occasionally curdle the fun.

True Lies poster

The Bourne Identity2002

Strip away the jokes and this is the amnesiac-assassin engine run straight, with muscle memory doing the storytelling and a colder, more paranoid European chill.

But Far more austere — no quips, no domestic comedy, just a man grimly reassembling himself.

The Bourne Identity poster

Kill Bill: Vol. 12003

Another woman with a buried past and a body that remembers what her mind tried to forget, dialed up into operatic, blood-soaked style.

But Tarantino's genre-collage approach and stylized violence are a much more extreme, arthouse-adjacent experience.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Manchurian Candidate1962

Same core nightmare — a person engineered into a killer without their consent — but played as bleak, sweaty political dread instead of quip-heavy action.

The original memory-as-weapon paranoia thriller: a soldier's mind has been rewritten by unseen hands, and the horror is realizing how much of 'you' was installed by someone else.

But Black-and-white Cold War pacing and Cold War politics feel a world away from Harlin's fireworks.

The Manchurian Candidate poster
More like this (8)

Mr. & Mrs. Smith2005

Trades mother-daughter stakes for marital ones, but it's the same pleasure: domestic normalcy cracking open to reveal two very competent killers underneath.

But Lighter and glossier throughout, more romantic comedy than thriller, with lower emotional stakes.

Mr. & Mrs. Smith poster

Salt2010

A sleeper agent's constructed identity unravels in real time, with Jolie doing plenty of her own brutal, committed stunt work.

But Plot twists arrive faster than logic can keep up, and the ending leaves things pointedly unresolved.

Salt poster

Atomic Blonde2017

Theron's spy is just as lethal, just as sardonic, in a Cold War Berlin soaked in neon and genuinely bone-crunching fight choreography.

But Plot is deliberately labyrinthine and secondary to mood and style — frustrating if you want a clean story.

Atomic Blonde poster

The Last Boy Scout1991no page yet

Also Shane Black, also a mismatched pair trading insults over exploding cars — the tonal blueprint this film was built from.

But Rougher, meaner, and more cynical, with a nastier undercurrent than its glossier successor.

Unknown2011no page yet

Liam Neeson wakes up unsure who he is and discovers the answer is much more dangerous than expected — same identity-thriller pleasure, colder European setting.

But Plays it straight and serious throughout — don't expect the banter or dark comic relief.

RED2010no page yet

Retired killers dragged back into the life, played by a cast clearly having a blast — the comedic-ensemble cousin of Samantha's predicament.

But Broader and goofier, trading the personal identity stakes for pure caper fun.

Nikita1990

The same premise — a lethal woman rebuilding an identity — but told as tender French tragedy instead of Hollywood shoot-'em-up comedy.

Luc Besson's original female-assassin-in-recovery story, moodier and more melancholic, about a woman trying to build a real self on top of the killer she was trained to be.

But Subtitled, slower, and far more interested in ache than banter — no wisecracking sidekick to lighten the load.

Nikita poster

Memento2000

Takes the exact same amnesia-as-mystery engine and strips out every joke, turning identity-loss into existential horror rather than an action-comedy hook.

A man with no working memory pieces together who he really is through fragments and tattoos, in a puzzle-box noir that's as much about grief as plot.

But Deliberately fractured, backwards-told structure demands real attention and offers zero comic relief.

Memento poster

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