Identity [2003]
Director: James Mangold
Actor: John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet, Alfred Molina, Jake Busey, Rebecca De Mornay
When a nasty storm hits a roadside motel in the middle of Nowhere, Nevada, ten strangers are all forced to get to know eachother while they ride out the storm. There’s a former hooker (Peet), going home to Florida to start a new life exploiting an orange grove, there’s a small family, mother – injured in a car accident at the start of the film – and her almost autistic son, and his step father, an incredibly nervous man who looks like a door-to-door salesman. Then there’s the ex-cop turned bodyguard/limo driver (Cusack), who, together with his client, a washed out actress, was driving LA when he hit the aforementioned mother on the road. There’s a newly wed couple, who got married for all the wrong reasons, the girl being insecure and the guy being a hot head. There’s teh motel manager, who later turns out to be anything but. And there’s the cop (Liotta), who’s escorting a prisoner (Busey).
When one by one they start dying, they find out that they’ve got more in common than they originally thought, and that the last one to remain will determine the outcome of a courthearing, deciding the fate of a death-row serial killer at the eve of his execution, which is taking place in another place and time.
The film is really very well done. It’s a “whodunnit” film with a nice twist. It’s well worth the rental fee.
