Identity (2003 film)

Identity
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	James Mangold
Screenplay by	Michael Cooney James Mangold
Story by	Michael Cooney
Based on	And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
Produced by	Cathy Konrad
Starring	John Cusack Ray Liotta Amanda Peet Alfred Molina Clea DuVall Rebecca De Mornay John Hawkes John C. McGinley William Lee Scott Jake Busey Pruitt Taylor Vince
Cinematography	Phedon Papamichael Jr.
Edited by	David Brenner
Music by	Alan Silvestri
Production companies	Columbia Pictures Konrad Pictures
Distributed by	Sony Pictures Releasing
Release date	April 25, 2003 (2003-04-25)
Running time	90 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$28 million[1]
Box office	$90.3 million[1]

Identity is a 2003 American ensemble neo-noir thriller film directed by James Mangold from a screenplay by Michael Cooney and Mangold, who both derived from Cooney's original story. The film stars John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet, Alfred Molina, Clea DuVall and Rebecca De Mornay.

Loosely based on Agatha Christie's 1939 whodunit And Then There Were None, the film follows ten strangers in an isolated hotel, who are temporarily cut off from the rest of the world, and are mysteriously killed off one by one. Several events which take place in the hours before the characters' arrival are introduced at key moments in the film using reverse chronology structure, and in a parallel story, a murderer awaits a verdict at a crucial trial that will determine whether he will be executed for his crimes.

The film grossed $90 million. It received polarized reviews from critics at the time of release, but has since slowly garnered a cult following.

Plot[]

A convict named Malcolm Rivers awaits execution for several vicious murders that took place at an apartment building. Journals belonging to Malcolm are discovered misfiled in the case evidence, not introduced during the trial. Malcolm's psychiatrist, Dr. Malick, and his defense attorney argue to use the evidence at a midnight hearing to prove Malcolm's insanity.

Meanwhile, ten strangers find themselves stranded in the middle of a torrential rainstorm at a remote Nevada motel, run by Larry Washington. The group consists of an ex-cop, now limousine driver, Ed Dakota; Caroline Suzanne, a washed-up, irritable actress; Officer Rhodes, who is transporting convicted murderer Robert Maine; Paris Nevada, a prostitute; newlyweds Lou and Ginny Isiana; and the York family, George, Alice and their nine-year-old son, Timmy.

With both ends of the road completely flooded, the group is forced to spend the night at the motel. As everyone is settling down for the night, Suzanne is killed by an unknown assailant. Ed soon discovers Suzanne's head in a dryer, along with the number 10 motel key. Maine is suspected to be the killer, who is found to have escaped.

Ed alerts the others about Suzanne's death and Maine's escape. Lou and Ginny get into a fight, leading them back to their motel room. Ginny locks herself in the bathroom as they argue through the door, only for Lou to be murdered, with his body found by the other guests in their room.

At the hearing, the contents of Malcolm's diaries are revealed, indicating Malcolm suffers from an extreme case of dissociative identity disorder, harboring eleven distinct personalities. His defense attorney argues that Malcolm is completely unaware of the crimes for which he is being executed, which is in violation of existing Supreme Court rulings on capital punishment. Dr. Malick is introducing the concept of integrating the personalities of someone with dissociative identity disorder as Malcolm is brought into the hearing.

While taking photos of Lou's crime scene and talking with Paris, Ed finds the number 9 key in Lou's bloody hands. He begins to suspect that the killer is counting down and targeting them in order. Meanwhile, Maine fails to escape the motel area, and is subdued by Rhodes and Ed. They tie Maine to a pole and Larry is appointed to guard him, but Maine is killed after Larry leaves his post. Rhodes and Ed find the number 8 key next to Maine's body, and harass Larry, who takes Paris hostage. Paris wrestles him off, causing Larry to run away and attempt to escape in his truck, but he accidentally crushes George against a dumpster as he tries to save Timmy from being run over.

Rhodes ties Larry to a chair, and orders the other guests to stay until dawn. Larry convinces Paris and Ed that he's not the perpetrator by telling them how he ended up at the motel. Alice, still in bed, is checked on and presumably has died from her injuries, but Rhodes finds the number 6 key. George's body is recovered from the front of Larry's truck and the number 7 key is found in his pocket, which confuses the others.

Ed tells Ginny and Timmy to flee in a car near the edge of the motel, but it explodes. The last four survivors discover that the bodies of all the previous victims have disappeared. Paris has a mental breakdown, revealing her birthday on May 10; it transpires that all eleven people were born on May 10 — which is also Malcolm's birthday, and the day he committed the murders.

Ed leaves the other three and checks their ID cards in the office, discovering that each one of them is named after a state, and that their birthdays all match. With Dr. Malick calling out to him, Ed finds he is at the hearing, but is confused as to why he is there. Dr. Malick explains that he is one of the personalities that Malcolm Rivers created as a child. Learning one of the personalities committed the murders, Ed is instructed to "go back" to the motel to try to eliminate them.

As Ed returns to the motel, Paris finds convict-transportation files for both Maine and Rhodes in the police car, revealing Rhodes is a criminal acting as an officer. Rhodes attacks Paris, but she is saved by Larry, who is shot to death by Rhodes. Finally believing Rhodes to be the murderous personality, Ed goes after him and the two men end up shooting each other fatally, leaving only Paris still alive.

With the homicidal personality removed, Malcolm's execution is stayed and he is ordered to be placed in a mental institution under Dr. Malick's care. In Malcolm's mind, Paris settles down in her hometown of Frostproof, Florida. As she tends to her orange grove, she discovers the number 1 key buried in the dirt, and finds Timmy behind her. It is revealed Timmy orchestrated all of the deaths at the motel, including faking his death. Timmy kills Paris, while Malcolm strangles Malick, causing the van that is en route to the mental institution to swerve off the road and stop before Timmy's voice repeats the poem "Antigonish" by William Hughes Mearns one more time.

Cast[]

• John Cusack as Edward "Ed" Dakota, a limousine driver and a former Los Angeles police officer
• Ray Liotta as Samuel Rhodes, an escaped convict masquerading as the correctional officer who was transporting him and Maine
• Amanda Peet as Paris Nevada, a prostitute leaving Las Vegas to buy a citrus grove in Florida
• John Hawkes as Larry Washington, the motel manager
• Clea DuVall as Ginny Virginia, a superstitious newlywed
• William Lee Scott as Lou Isiana, Ginny's husband
• Rebecca De Mornay as Caroline Suzanne, an '80s Hollywood TV actress chauffeured by Ed
• Leila Kenzle as Alice York, a wife and mother who is injured in a car accident
• John C. McGinley as George York, Alice's husband and Timmy's stepfather
• Bret Loehr as Timothy "Timmy" York, Alice's son and George's stepson
• Jake Busey as Robert Maine, Rhodes' fellow inmate still in his prison jumpsuit
• Pruitt Taylor Vince as Malcolm Rivers, a convicted mass murderer
• Alfred Molina as Dr. Malick, Rivers' psychiatrist
• Holmes Osborne as Judge Taylor
• Frederick Coffin as Detective Varole
• Carmen Argenziano as Defense Lawyer and Attorney
• Matt Letscher as Assistant District Attorney
• Marshall Bell as District Attorney

Production[]

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All filming was undertaken in the United States. Some took place in Lancaster, California and other places in Los Angeles County, while the majority was shot on a sound stage at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City.

Angelo Badalamenti was originally signed to score the film, but his music was replaced with a new score by Alan Silvestri (Silvestri had previously replaced Badalamenti on 1991's Shattered).

Reception[]

Critical response[]

Roger Ebert gave the film three stars out of four and wrote, "I've seen a lot of movies that are intriguing for the first two acts and then go on autopilot with a formula ending. Identity is a rarity, a movie that seems to be on autopilot for the first two acts and then reveals that it was not, with a third act that causes us to rethink everything that has gone before. Ingenious, how simple and yet how devious the solution is."^[2]

Mick LaSalle of SFGate reported, "At first, Identity seems like nothing more than a pleasing and blatant homage (i.e., rip-off) to the Agatha Christie-style thriller where marooned guests realize that a murderer is in their midst... we've seen it before. Yet make no mistake. Identity is more than an entertaining thriller. It's a highly original one."^[3]

The Village Voice's Dennis Lim wrote of the film's premise, "The premise of the one-rainy-night thriller Identity seems like mothballed Agatha Christie," and of the film's third act twist, "The ultimate cliché of plot-twist implausibility, the crucial revelation is so outlandishly fatuous it might have given Donald Kaufman pause. But there's nothing self-parodic about Identity—the viewer must not only swallow the nullifying third-act bombshell but actually re-engage with the movie on its new, extremely dubious terms."^[4]

Brian Mckay of eFilmCritic.com wrote, "This film's cardinal sin was not that it had an engrossing but extremely far-fetched setup to a lackluster resolution—a resolution that probably sounded good during the initial script pitch, but which nobody realized was going to be such a misfire until the production was already at the point of no return. No, what Identity is guilty of most is bad timing—it simply gives away too much, too soon. At about the halfway mark (if not much sooner), the film's big "twist" will finally dawn on you (and if it doesn't, they'll end up coming right out and saying it five minutes later anyway). And once it does, you will no longer care what happens afterward."^[5]

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 62% based on 173 reviews, with an average rating of 6.40/10. The site's consensus states: "Identity is a film that will divide audiences—the twists of its plot will either impress or exasperate you."^[6] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 64 out of 100 based on 34 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".^[7] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.^[8]

Box office performance[]

Identity opened on April 25, 2003 in the United States and Canada in 2,733 theaters.^[1] The film ranked at #1 on its opening weekend, accumulating $16,225,263, with a per theater average of $5,936.^[9] The film's five-day gross was $18,677,884.^[10]

The film dropped down to #3 on its second weekend, behind newly released X2 and The Lizzie McGuire Movie, accumulating $9,423,662 in a 41.9% drop from its first weekend, and per theater average of $3,448.^[11] By its third weekend it dropped down to #4 and made $6,477,585, $2,474 per theater average.^[12]

Identity went on to gross $52.1 million in the United States and Canada and $38.1 million overseas. In total, the film has grossed over $90 million worldwide, making it a box office success against its $28 million budget.^[1]

Accolades[]

The film was nominated for Best Action, Adventure or Thriller Film and Best DVD Special Edition Release at 30th Saturn Awards, but lost to Kill Bill Volume 1 and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, respectively.

References[]

Further reading[]

• Earnshaw, Tony, ed. (2016). "James Mangold and Cathy Konrad – Identity". Fantastique: Interviews with Horror, Sci-Fi & Fantasy Filmmakers (Volume 1). pp. 208–221. ISBN 978-1-59393-944-1.

External links[]

• Identity at IMDb
• Identity at Rotten Tomatoes
• Identity at Metacritic
• Identity at Box Office Mojo