17 Spy Movies That’ll Have You On The Edge Of Your Seat

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Liam Neeson is back in spy mode with The Fix, a CIA thriller about disillusioned operators pulling off a daring rescue in Tehran.

The Fix is out on Sept. 11, so here are 17 espionage flicks to get you in the mood in the meantime.

1. Taken (2008)

Neeson plays a retired CIA operative who tears across Europe to save his kidnapped daughter and her friend after they are kidnapped by traffickers.

2. Inheritance (2025)

A young woman discovers her estranged father's real estate business is actually a front for international money laundering and espionage—and finds herself mixed up in an international conspiracy.

3. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)

Based on the seminal seminal Cold War espionage novel by John le Carré. A retired English spy returns to MI-6 under suspicion that he's become a Soviet operative.

4. Sicario (2015)

Directed by Denis Villeneuve, this acclaimed action / crime thriller follows a principled FBI special agent who is enlisted by a government task force to bring down the leader of a powerful and brutal Mexican drug cartel.

5. Humint (2026)

Follows a South Korean intelligence agent investigating a criminal network on the Russian border, leading to a tense, chaotic clash with a North Korean agent over a shared informant

6. The Bourne Identity (2002)

Matt Damon plays the iconic assassin with psychogenic amnesia, who tries to piece together his past while an entire agency wants him dead. This film replaced the classic 

7. The Secret Agent (2025)

Set during the 1977 Brazilian military dictatorship, it follows a technology researcher fleeing state forces during Carnival. He finds himself trapped in a suffocating web of surveillance as hitmen slowly close in on his location.

8. Black Bag (2025)

A tense espionage drama that explores loyalty and suspected betrayal within an intelligence marriage.

9. Mission: Impossible - Fallout (2018)

In which Ethan Hunt races against time to stop a nuclear attack with stolen plutonium. Widely considered one of the best entries in the franchise, with jaw-dropping practical stunts.

10. The Age of Shadows (2016)

A stylish and tense period thriller about Korean resistance fighters smuggling explosives from Shanghai into Japanese-occupied Seoul during the 1920s.

11. Skyfall (2012)

In the twenty-third installment of the James Bond franchise, 007 comes out of retirement to track down a former MI6 agent turned cyberterrorist who is bent on killing M.

12. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965)

Another film based on an acclaimed, best-selling novel by John le Carré, this one follows a Cold War spy (played by Richard Burton) on one final dangerous mission in East Germany. 

13. Salt (2010)

CIA officer, Evelyn Salt, is accused of being a Russian sleeper agent and goes on the run to prove her innocence. This film has a very twisty plot.

14. The Lives of Others (2006)

A deeply moving German thriller-drama about a secret police Stasi officer conducting surveillance on a playwright and his wife in East Berlin, only to become increasingly absorbed by their lives.

15. Zero Dark Thirty (2012)

A CIA analyst spends a decade obsessively tracking down Osama bin Laden. Kathryn Bigelow's fast-paced, documentary-like procedural approach makes the hunt feel painstakingly, almost unbearably real.

16. Foreign Correspondent (1940)

Alfred Hitchcock’s fast-paced Hollywood thriller follows an American crime reporter as he uncovers an international assassin and spy ring in Europe on the eve of World War II.

17. The Ipcress File (1965)

Michael Caine plays the reluctant British intelligence agent Harry Palmer, who investigates the mysterious kidnapping and brainwashing of top nuclear scientists.

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