The Long Kiss Goodnight (Limited Edition) 4K UHD Review

Arrow Video

4K UHD Release: April 8th, 2025

Video: 2.39:1/2160p/Color

Audio: English Dolby Atmos, English Dolby TrueHD 7.1, English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and 2.0

Subtitles: English SDH

Run Time: 109:18

Director: Renny Harlin

Samantha Caine (Geena Davis) has a pretty ordinary life -- she's a proud mother to a young girl, Caitlin (Yvonne Zima), she's seeing a nice man named Hal (Tom Amandes), she teaches grade school, and she's in the PTA. There's only one catch: while you wouldn't know it to look at her, she's also got a secret past, secret to even herself, thanks to "focal retrograde amnesia" -- she has no idea about her life before eight years ago. That life comes rushing back after a car accident jogs her memory, and she starts to learn about her former existence as Charly Baltimore, a highly skilled asssassin for the CIA. With the help of mildly disreputable private investigator Mitch Hennessy (Samuel L. Jackson), Samantha sets on a road trip to find out about her former life, only to get wrapped up in a terrorist bombing plot that forces Charly out of retirement.

As someone who arrived at their love of films through cult movies (namely, Entertainment Weekly's list of the top 50 Cult Movies of All Time), one gets used to the idea that many very good films are simply overlooked for one reason or another. Take the Wachowski sisters' Speed Racer adaptation, which was doing something visually ambitious and surprisingly cutting, politically, or the cult detective movie Zero Effect, which features a pre-Something About Mary Ben Stiller and Bill Pullman in a Sherlock Holmes-inspired mystery years before "Elementary" or "Sherlock" or the Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes hit the screen. The Long Kiss Goodnight, on the other hand, is a true head-scratcher. How could audiences have passed on Thelma and Louise and A League of Their Own's Geena Davis and Pulp Fiction's Samuel L. Jackson teaming up in an action movie by the director of Die Hard 2 and Cliffhanger? Are they stupid, or did they take lessons?

Okay, okay: to be fair, Davis and Harlin were coming off of the notorious Cutthroat Island, the perfectly fine movie that nonetheless became the cautionary tale against Hollywood making pirate movies for over a decade when it bankrupted Carolco Pictures. Again, those who had actually seen Cutthroat Island ought to have thought, "well, luck of the draw," because it's a perfectly entertaining film (which now has its own 4K treatment thanks to Studio Canal), but at least it's a little understandable why the combination of Davis and Harlin might've been viewed as box office poison (especially with Davis' and Harlin's own marriage blowing up like a tanker truck during production, although I can't say how much of that made the tabloids in 1996). Still, even now, on the cusp of the movie's 30th anniversary, this is a crackerjack combination of screenplay, action, and star chemistry that this critic would easily place among the best action movies of the '90s.

For one thing, The Long Kiss Goodnight is an underrecognized example of a female-fronted action movie. Davis, who has long advocated for gender parity in Hollywood and who has even gone onto found the Geena Davis Institute for Gender in Media, is absolutely delightful as both the mild-mannered Samantha Caine and her superhero-level alter ego Charly Baltimore. One might wonder, aside from her marriage, why an actor in those "classier" productions like T&L and League would want to do a silly action movie like this one, but what are essentially dual roles provide Davis the opportunity to play pretty much everything: the sweetly loving wife, the woman with secrets, the sidekick, the damsel in distress, the badass heroine, and the caring mother. Frankly, it's hard to imagine an assignment more fun, and there's no question she's up for the task, whether she's gunning down headhunters in an alley or skating across ponds to cap a driver and a couple of goons in the middle of a chase. Not to give it away for those who might be checking out Long Kiss Goodnight for the first time, but her climactic action beat and au revoir one-liner are one for the books, as well as a final beat that feels like Harlin was trying to add up the fiery explosions in all three Die Hard movies.

With such a great lead and plenty of action, the movie is already off to a great start, and then on top of that we get Samuel L. Jackson in what Jackson himself has routinely cited as his favorite of his own movies. Mitch Hennessy is a perfect fit for Jackson: a sly private eye who might be overcharging Samantha but nonetheless gets the job done, armed with a wicked sense of humor and a surprisingly steady moral compass. It's great fun to watch Jackson, who often commands the screen, playing second-fiddle to Davis, and the Shane Black script is naturally packed with great banter for them to bounce off of each other, whether they're discussing the virtues of catcalling or the likelihood of escaping New Jersey. Throw in Craig Bierko as an especially slimy villain named Timothy and a plot about staging a bomb at a Christmas parade in order to scare up some more defense dollars in Congress, and you've got a funny, action-packed ride that's ripe for re-evaluation.

Video

I was already pretty happy with Warner's 2011 Blu-ray edition of The Long Kiss Goodnight in the A/V department. To me, that transfer looked in line with the kind of presentations they were offering at the time, with strong colors and decent fine detail in brighter lighting. Still, Arrow's new 4K UHD offers a noticeable upgrade in depth, detail, and color, with the film achieving a slightly more naturalistic look and improved clarity. Skin texture is more refined, and the HDR pass is subtle, providing realistic-looking colors that are nicely saturated without completely altering the film's traditional palette. It's not a night-and-day difference for me (even if the differences are more striking when doing a direct A-B comparison), but fans should be pretty pleased by this new upgrade.

Audio

Warner's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track from the original disc also gets an upgrade, with a full Atmos track on offer. I admit I'm more of a videophile than an audiophile, but even I noticed the increased subtleties and directional variations on this bold new audio presentation, which provides a rock-'em sock-'em punchiness that fits with the film's over-the-top panache during the explosions, and does a good job of orienting viewers in each individual environment in less action-oriented scenes. Purists will also appreciate that unlike Warner's original Blu-ray, this UHD offers an original theatrical stereo mix as well (although the 5.1 track is also a theatrical mix, as far as I can tell). English SDH captions are also provided.

Extras

Much like Arrow's recent release of The Cell, this is another special edition where the label, for whatever reason, could not swing participation from any of the key players, namely Davis, Jackson, Harlin, or Black. It's fair to say that Davis and Harlin may have wanted to avoid reuniting given their personal history, but Davis seems to regard the film well even if it was tough behind the scenes, and of course Jackson, as mentioned, considers it his favorite of his own films. In any case, it's a shame none of them could have been involved with the disc -- a Davis/Jackson commentary would've been one of my most-anticipated extras of the year. (No shade on Arrow; perhaps everyone was just busy.)

Disc 1 (4K UHD):

• Audio commentary by film critic Walter Chaw - The Film Freak Central critic delivers a traditional, scholarly commentary, with the usual background on the cast and crew, discussion of the making of the film, its unfortunate box office and eventual reappraisal as a cult film, and more.

• Audio commentary by Drusilla Adeline and Joshua Conkel - The co-hosts of the Bloodhaus podcast provide a second commentary that is more akin to a fan commentary, with a more relaxed approach to appreciating and analyzing the film. For me, this was the more enjoyable of the two tracks, and arguably more in keeping with the loose, rock-and-roll attitude of the film itself.

• Image Gallery (5:20) - A massive 312 images make up this lengthy still gallery.

• Theatrical Trailer (2:33)

  
  

Disc 2 (Blu-ray):

• "Girl Interrupted" Interview with actor Yvonne Zima (16:02) - I'll admit it -- I wasn't expecting much from this interview, given Zima's character is more important within the plot than prominent in the film, but Zima has such wonderful memories of being on set. She discusses the audition process, in which Harlin was wowed by her performance of the scene near the end where Caitlin essentially resurrects Samantha on the bridge (including a clip of the audition); insight into the script and the little jokes that Black puts in just for the reader; everything she learned from Davis, her memories of Jackson, Bierko, and Malahide; her extra-curricular activities off the set; doing her own stunts; and more. Frankly, she is so engaging and insightful that one could easily believe that she might get more work on the strength of the interview alone! Only minor complaint is that at least one of the clips (of Charly discussing distraction techniques with Mitch) seems completely irrelevant -- and clips from the film are already a bit of a crutch for this type of interview, so it stands out.

• "Symphony of Destruction" Interview with stunt coordinator Steve Davidson (9:06) - Davidson basically goes through the movie stunt by stunt -- a film he calls "the most difficult one I've ever done" -- and discusses how they were done, such as a Jacuzzi underwater for the scene of Samantha and Mitch emerging from the ice. As with the Zima interview, props are given to Davis for fully committing to many of her own stunts, and he has a funny story about the guy who ends up dangling from the Christmas lights while on fire. That said, he kind of glosses over the actual stunt where Davis flies up to grab the gun. What an oversight!

• "Long Live the New Flesh" Interview with makeup artist Gordon J. Smith (11:53) - Smith jumps right into the creation of the dummy created for Brian Cox's character Waldman, followed by the creation of a mask for one of Davis' stunt doubles (including some great photos of the mask, including Davis next to the double). Unexpectedly, the bulk of the interview turns out to be about silicone, with Smith diving into the way breast implants affected the advancement of technology in film makeup. Although the story ends with Smith having to push to get credit for his innovations, the film world needs more technicians like this, who is not just trying to do what is necessary for the project at hand, but trying to move their entire art form forward.

• "Amnesia Chick" Visual essay by film scholar Josh Nelson (19:32) - In the first of three essays, Nelson takes a deep dive into the history and themes of movies depicting amnesia, and the crisis of identity that stems from not being able to remember who you are. In particular, this focuses on the resurgence of amnesia in the '90s through to the present, touching on movies like Total Recall, Mulholland Dr., Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and of course, The Long Kiss Goodnight, which is highlighted as a rare movie where the amnesiac is a woman.

• "The Mirror Crack'd" Visual essay by critic and filmmaker Howard J. Berger, with Kevin Marr and Angela McEntree (38:36) - This second essay dives into the themes of the film, examining the dichotomy between Samantha's "normal" domestic life and Charly's deadly career as an assassin, and how those two make for an unexpectedly good pairing that accentuates the "midlife crisis" concept while also partially subverting it.

• "A Woman's World" Visual essay by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas (14:20) - The third and final essay focuses on Davis, who has been very outspoken on the limitations that women over 40 face in the industry, eventually founding the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. Naturally, Heller-Nicholas dives into the way The Long Kiss Goodnight is groundbreaking as a rare '90s action movie starring a woman, and how it fits into her career and comments on what it's like being a woman in Hollywood.

• Deleted Scenes (2:32) - I can't say I expected much out of two random deleted scenes from the movie, but now that I've seen them, I'm kind of mad both of them were cut out of the movie. Both offer an additional over-the-top stunt that was reshot or cut out of the film. In the first, during the car/skate chase, instead of simply skating up to the car and taking out the guys inside, Charly pirouettes in the air over the hood while she takes them down. In the second, during the climactic chase, before she's commandeered the tanker truck, she holds the parade Santa at gunpoint in order to catch up to the tanker, then steps off the sleigh onto the top of a moving car, shooting down into the roof to take out the two passengers, and then hops onto the tanker. In addition to being fucking awesome, this also makes the bad brakeline less arbitrary, as a gunman accidentally shoots it, causing the leak. I know the movie is almost 30 years old, but is it too late to fire the guy who cut both of these scenes out of the film? If these bits weren't offered in VHS quality, I'd have advocated them both to be put back in.

• Original Making-of Featurette (5:53) - I'm happy for any behind-the-scenes insight from the primary players, but this is a pretty traditionally over-produced featurette, with talking heads that are distractingly dynamic, featuring a roving camera on a whole special set, which makes the whole thing feel pre-written rather than authentic. There is also a bit of behind-the-scenes on the second cut-out stunt, which again makes me mad it's not still in the movie. Much of the featurette is also very tonally weird, which makes it feel like less of a surprise that the movie was not a theatrical hit -- I'm not sure the studio knew how to market it. (I know Long Kiss Goodnight was made first, but don't they know that Semisonic's "F.N.T." is a song that belongs to 10 Things I Hate About You?)

• Promotional Interviews - Tragically short archival interview clips from the EPK. These are from the same shoot as the interviews that appear in the above featurette, so they are shot in the same annoying way, although they are improved by not having rock music blasted over them.

  • Renny Harlin (2:16)

  • Geena Davis (1:28)

  • Samuel L. Jackson (1:24)

  • Craig Bierko (0:42)

• Behind-the-Scenes (8:14) - Other than the two deleted scenes, this is probably the best of the archival footage, a candid collection of clips from the set, mostly focused on the stunt sequences. Highlight: the gigantic grin on Sam Jackson's face after they film the jump from the window at the train station.

As with The Cell, this is another one of Arrow's smaller Limited Editions, featuring two discs in a standard UK-style case. Retail editions will come with a slipcover featuring a new cover design by Sam Hadley (another one where I instantly think, "hmm, weren't allowed to use actors' likenesses, eh?", a corny Christmas postcard of Jackson, a Thin Ice sticker, and a booklet featuring new writing by Clem Bastow, Richard Kadrey, Maura McHugh, and Priscilla Page. (No packaging was included with Genre Grinder's review copy.)

Conclusion

In case it wasn't clear from the full review above, it is this critic's opinion that The Long Kiss Goodnight should be talked about alongside movies like The Rock and Face/Off as one of the most entertaining action movies of the '90s. Davis and Jackson make for a knockout combo, Shane Black's script is funny from beginning to end, and the action is dynamite. Even if it's a shame that the bonus features feature no new participation from the principle players, just getting the film on 4K UHD is worth it, especially with the fine new presentation offered here. The bonus features are just icing on the cake -- and they're surprisingly great even without the marquee names. Those fucking deleted scenes! Highly recommended.

The images on this page are taken from the original Warner Bros. Blu-ray and sized for the page, as Arrow is not releasing a Blu-ray version of this set. Larger versions can be viewed by clicking the images, but they are not representative of the new transfer. Note that there will be some JPG compression.