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Identity: Film Review© Kelcey Woolsten
May 12, 2003
Identity is part psychological thriller, part horror film and manages to take the best of both genres. It begins with a couple with a child stopping to change a tire as and the woman getting run over by a passing car. The driver of the car (John Cusack) is driving a spoiled actress (Rebecca De Mornay) who insists they leave the couple but he opts to take responsibility for the accident and drives them to a nearby motel before going to seek help. A storm in the area makes getting help near impossible and also forces others to seek shelter in the eerie, isolated motel including an unhappy young couple (Clea DuVall, 10 Conversations About One Thing, and William Lee Scott), a retired hooker (Amanda Peet), and an officer (Ray Liotta) transporting a psychotic prisoner (Jake Busey). Rounding out the cast is John Hawkes as the creepy motel owner. Each party is assigned to a room, with keys numbered from 1 to 10. As the night wears on, one by one, the motel guests die, some obviously murdered and some the victims of what seem like accidents. As the guests are eliminated, a key is found by each body implying a countdown that will only end when only one of the 11 motel occupants is left. While the motel occupants are fighting for their lives, nearby a serial killer Malcolm Rivers (Pruitt Taylor Vince, Heavy) is fighting for a stay of execution assisted by his doctor (Alfred Molina), who is arguing that Rivers belongs in a mental health facility instead of on death row. How these stories converge provides one of the most interesting and unexpected plot twists seen in the modern thriller. Aside from an intriguing, compelling story and a surprise ending, Identity has several things going for it. Like in the best of horror films, there are several genuinely frightening moments with tension followed by shock or surprise. The motel also provides the perfect setting for the horror film-dark, isolated, run down, and rainy. However, the film is elevated beyond the typical slasher flick through its themes of coincidence, the conflict amongst the characters, and the overwhelming sense that things are more than what they seem and that all of the characters have come together in the motel for a reason, albeit a deadly one. The puzzle and its unusual solution make this film more Alfred Hitchcock than John Carpenter.
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