Identity (2003)

Sorry, this movie sucks

From my favorite movies..

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Identity by James Mangold is a good thriller. Boasting of a huge cast it is a take on the Agatha Christie idea of death of every character one by one as the killer is finally revealed. The setup is a motel in Texas where one night a group of 10 strangers come together and one by one start getting hacked off. The acting is uniformly good and the pacing is good. Identity has a 60 percent average overall but it is a better effort than that.

This movie jumped right away in my Top 50 movies list. I am a huge fan of mistery movies and psychological thrillers like this one that keep you awake throughout every second of the movie, without blinking. You are always trying to think one step ahead, guessing, trying to make a logical explanation about who might the killer really be, who is who, why is this here and why is this happening here. All of that work your brain did, just so you come to the end and see that it was all for nothing because there is a gigantic plot twist that changes the whole perspective of the movie. This ladies and gents, this is a piece of art. Oh and yes, I really love John Cusack's acting. He is a true talent.

Spoilers warning: for a 14-year-old movie Stumbling across this DVD recently, I looked up some reviews by both critics and users. A bit surprising that they are unanimously favourable.The fiendishly tantalising thing in these critic reviews is the references to the clever twist. They generally tell you that it is so clever that you cannot possibly see it coming. Then, one or two of them drop torturous hints that well, maybe, just maybe you can get something from this or that particular scene. If you don't think you have truly experienced frustration, try reading some of these critic reviews on "Identity".The main story, for those who know (from book or screen) Agatha Christie's popular mystery about ten people stranded in an isolated location being killed off one after another (title changed so many times, for political correctness, that I won't bother), look familiar. But look is deceiving.The "parallel" story, intersecting the main story with much shorter scenes, starts with an exasperated judge being called in late hours to hear the defence's final plead for a serial murderer going to execution in 24 hours. The psychiatrist's defence is multiple-personality, which might be novel for the 2003 movie, has been exploited to the fullest in the recent "Split" (2016).While the key plot twist was considered really clever back in 2003, it is less so for today's seasoned audience. It does not take a lot to put two and two together: the murder mystery is something in the serial killer's mind. With this one clean broad stroke, anything and everything that looks implausible is neatly exonerated. Not Agatha Christie after all - no ingenious plot. But there is one small FINAL twist that is quite clever. In the murder mystery (in the serial killer's head, remember), the sole survivor finds peace and quiet in the life she seeks. But a loose end has been hanging – two of the earlier victims met their death heading towards a car that exploded, presumably killing them. But absolutely nothing remained of these two, not even a small piece of charred substance. This was glossed over in the scene. But when one of those two (a pre-teen boy) turns up to kill the "sole survivor", the audience is not really surprised. It would appear that this is the true killer. But those in the audience who take one more step in their thinking will remember that there is one other purportedly killed in the car explosion. It is a woman, who never appears again. She is most likely to be the final, final true killer. This, however, is never confirmed in the movie.Despite the fact that the "clever twists" have lost their freshness, this is a movie well worth watching, for the good direction (James Mangold) and cast which includes John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet, John Hawkes and Alfred Molina.

Identity is a movie of 2003. I am a lover of Thrilling movies. So, I have watched it some month ago. After watching this, I cannot imagine that it is a movie of 2003. It has several twists that changed the genre of the movie. At first I have thought that it is a horror film but twist changed everything. All actor showed their best. So, It is a must watch film indeed. Thanks Hollywood for making this brilliant movie.