“Identity” follows in the story-telling tradition which places approximately ten characters in a confined space, brutally murders them, and leaves the audience to figure out who the psycho is. If the scenario seems played out, it’s because it is. Director James Mangold and writer Michael Cooney must have been aware that this would account for a gimmicky surprise ending.
Through a variety of unlucky circumstances, a group of strangers are brought together to spend the night at a remote motel. All roads leading out are blocked by floodwaters resulting from an incessant storm. Forced to check into this roadside dive, the customers aren’t even able to properly unpack before members of the rag-tag party begin having their heads lopped off by a mysterious killer.
To make the situation even creepier, the murderer is eliminating his victims in the order of the room numbers they occupy. Meanwhile in a meeting room, a judge is reviewing a last minute hearing to a murder case on the night of the murderer’s execution. New information has been brought to light, and the killer has been found to have a dissociative disorder that makes him ineligible for the death penalty in his state. These two seemingly unrelated stories unfold in turn only to become related in the surprise ending.
It might be unfair to classify this particular film as a slasher movie, but in order to classify it as a psychological thriller, a script would be necessary. Lacking this, it is best to judge this particular piece on its merits as an ordered exercise in the killing of malformed characters in the tradition of the American slasher film. Conventional wisdom tells us that a good slasher film needs a good slasher. The murderer is invisible throughout the film, and moviegoers are left to rely on the knife fodder which is the cast for entertainment.
The results of this are a bit uneven. John Cusack plays Ed, a limo driver whose spoiled Hollywood cargo is beheaded early in the film. Ed also happens to be a former cop who reads Sartre in his spare time. He takes control of the situation early in the film when people start turning up dead. As the most proficient actor, Cusack is also responsible for delivering anything that even hints at emotional intensity. Much of the story is actually told through his perspective – a wise decision.
Playing opposite Cusack is Ray Liotta as Rhodes, a law officer who is transporting a dangerous prisoner. Liotta is only effective at one volume – loud. His crowning role was that of Henry Hill the coke-snorting, wife-beating gangster, often prone to fits of violence in “Goodfellas.” Needless to say, the only scenes in this film in which he is effective involve him waving a pistol and spewing expletive at anyone in the room.
The greatest sin committed in this film was the casting of Amanda Peet in a speaking part. Peet plays Paris, the soon to be reformed prostitute with a heart of gold – a character so cliché it should be legally put to rest by an act of Congress – originates from Florida. Naturally, she must speak with a southern accent. The problem is she seems to forget this in some scenes. This is a blatant example of a thespians failure to assume the role she is supposed to be playing, a cardinal sin in anyone’s book. It might not have been so distracting had the accent been more authentic. It sounded like Peet overheard a waitress taking orders at a Waffle House in Terre Haute, Indiana, and adopted this as her “authentic” southern accent – sometimes.
The only redeeming quality of this film is the twist at the end. Farfetched, psychologically unfeasible, and kind of silly, the twist at the end does make the viewer go back and examine certain details in the film in an attempt to make sense of the new information. This is the mark of a truly good trick-ending.
The movie might succeed to some as a pleasant diversion, but to most, a snazzy ending won’t be enough to save this one from the generic plot, and uneven acting.
