If you loved
The Innocent
Ian McEwan · Book · 1998
What hooked you in The Innocent was the way the cold, calculated machinery of global espionage forces a profound personal awakening.
Start with the source
Adaptation
The Innocent
Oriol Paulo · Series · 2021
Adaptation
The Innocent
Louis Garrel · Film · 2022
Films on the same thread
Never Look Away
Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck · Film · 2018
Like The Innocent, this film captures the weight of living in a divided Germany, where the trauma of the past forces a young man to confront his own developing identity.
Inception
Christopher Nolan · Film · 2010
Much like the clandestine surveillance in The Innocent, this story explores the blurred lines between reality and deception as a professional navigates the dangerous consequences of his secret work.
The Lives of Others
Film · 2006
This film mirrors the surveillance themes of The Innocent by showing how a dedicated observer becomes humanly entangled with his targets, leading to a shift in his moral landscape.
Atomic Blonde
David Leitch · Film · 2017
If you enjoyed the tense atmosphere of Cold War Berlin in The Innocent, you will appreciate this gritty investigation into the high-stakes world of international betrayal and espionage.
Series on the same thread
The Night Manager
David Farr · Series · 2016
This series captures the same moral ambiguity found in The Innocent, following an operative whose life is transformed after being pulled into a dangerous, shadowy international conspiracy.
Babylon Berlin
Tom Tykwer · Series · 2017
Berlin serves as a central character here just as it does in The Innocent, grounding the narrative in a period of intense political transition and profound social decay.
Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan
Graham Roland · Series · 2018
Similar to Leonard Marnham in The Innocent, this protagonist is forced to leave the safety of his desk job to confront the dangerous reality of global political intrigue.
Severance
Dan Erickson · Series · 2022
This show echoes the tension of The Innocent by focusing on how the compartmentalization of one's professional life eventually demands a reckoning with one's true sense of self.
Podcasts on the same thread
S-Town
Serial Productions · Podcast · 2024
If The Innocent hit, S-Town shares the thread.
Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend
Team Coco & Earwolf · Podcast · 2026
If The Innocent hit, Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend shares the thread.
Keep exploring
Common questions
Is The Innocent (1998) related to the 2021 TV show or 2022 movie?
The book The Innocent by Ian McEwan, published in 1998, is a distinct work from the 2021 TV adaptation and the 2022 movie. While they share the title The Innocent, the source material specifically refers to the 1998 novel set in 1950s Berlin.
What is the setting of the book The Innocent?
The Innocent is set in Berlin during a time when the city was divided between East and West. The story follows a British-American surveillance team operating within this fractured environment as they navigate international plots and personal transformation.
Who is the main character in The Innocent?
The protagonist of The Innocent is Leonard Marnham, a twenty-five-year-old man assigned to a surveillance team in Berlin. Throughout the narrative, he attempts to escape his ordinary life and loses his innocence while acting as a pawn in an international plot.
Is The Innocent based on a true story?
The Innocent is a fictional novel written by Ian McEwan in 1998. It tells the story of Leonard Marnham, an individual involved in secret surveillance work in divided Berlin, but it is not a factual account or a true story.