Identity making you Question your Own

                Identity is a movie that was introduced to me by my boyfriend. He likes to show me all these really great off the wall movies that somehow made it past me as I gathered my collection of over 1,000 movies and tv shows. This was really an interesting movie to me, but it is sadly one of those movies that you are only completely enthralled with the first time you see it. After the first time the surprise is gone and from the very beginning you know the surprise at the end, but in my book movies like this can be fun if you watch it a second time and see if you can pick up hints that you missed the first time. My opinion is that it is a real puzzler that everyone should try to puzzle through at least once.

                One dark and rainy night 10 strangers find themselves with no choice but to stay the night at an old motel in the middle of nowhere. The worst thing that people are worrying about at this motel is cockroaches and mice but what they should be worried about is how they will make it through the night. As the guests begin to die one by one will they be able to stop the killer before there is no one left?

                When my boyfriend told me about Identity it sounded like any other slasher film that Hollywood had made. But I was proven wrong as I sat watching this original idea come across the screen. I can’t say exactly what makes it original without completely ruining the movie for anyone who hasn’t seen it but let me just say that the real story of this movie is quite the surprise. Michael Cooney, the writer, definitely knew what he was doing when he wrote this gem of a movie. However, I do have to nitpick that some of the characters were very much clichés and it seemed that he could have used a little more imagination while outlining these people. I mean if I had a dime for every movie with an actor playing a washed up actor who spends all their time on screen trying to show that they are still important and deserve to be treated as such then I would have enough money to at least buy a half way decent car. The colors of this movie were almost completely the same through the whole thing, however they were not exactly the same. If you pay enough attention you will notice that at parts of the film a little more color is added to the pallet. But for the most part, since the movie takes place at night, the color pallet is very dark and the colors are muted. Of course with that said you should know that the blood tends to be the brightest color (even though sometimes it is too bright and looks as fake as it really is). The director, James Mangold, seemed to really want the audience to see the blood and be drawn into the horrible deaths of the people. Before I end this review I would like to say that the boy who played Timmy York, Bret Loehr, did an amazing job. Hollywood tends to go for the child actors that look good when filmed but not when acting, but Bret had it all. He was very convincing in his role and it almost made me worry that maybe this role might have screwed with his head a bit but he seems to have moved on nicely in his career. I almost forget to mention the great use of a poem that is apparently very popular to use in movies. In Identity they quote lines from the poem Antigonish (I met a man who wasn’t there). It’s a haunting poem and it really added something to the spooky level of the movie, it sort of makes your skin crawl as the characters say it throughout the movie. Okay, now I must stop talking about Identity before I give away the best parts. The end result is that this movie may not be for those with a weak stomach and it is definitely not a family film but it is a movie that you should see at least once. So mull it over and then go rent Identity and enjoy trying to figure out the movie before the movie shows you what you were missing.

Questioning your identity a bit? Maybe if you watch this trailer you'll have a better grasp on things.

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