Identity

(2003) ****

In the middle of a raging storm, ten strangers find themselves stuck at a nowhere motel one night in the Nevada desert. Meanwhile, the life of a death-row maniac is on the line as an emergency midnight hearing is called to determine his sanity. The D.A. is pissed, the judge is pissed, and the police captain is especially pissed to have such a dangerous prisoner transported during a storm. And where the hell is he, anyway?

This movie starts at a brisk run, using an engaging quick-flashback style. The hotel clerk is alone with Wheel of Fortune and suddenly a man comes in holding his bleeding wife, and bam! We’re with the married couple pre-accident, watching them get a flat tire due to a shoe in the road, and bam! We see earlier that day, as a prostitute (played by the always welcome Amanda Peet) loses that shoe in the road. Then we whip back to the married couple and their son, dealing with their flat tire when Mom accidentally walks in front of the limo driven by John Cusack.

All the maneuvering of these opening scenes is handled in a tight, deft style in order to gather and introduce our characters. There is a palpable sense of being trapped where they are, as if it’s the only place in the world. John Cusack is at his most appealing, playing ruffled and humble but also quietly in charge. When he collides with the wife, the actress he’s driving wants him to drive on, but he doesn’t even think about it. Moments later, when she locks her door and refuses to give him her phone, he smashes the window without hesitating and takes it. Any worries about keeping his job evaporate the moment of the accident. It feels like I’ve seen about two dozen scenarios this month involving a car crash, and Cusack’s bold decisiveness is refreshing like a cold drink.

Soon after our players are assembled, they start getting picked off. The survivors do their best to hold it together, but their numbers keep dwindling and the panic keeps growing. This movie is pretty darn good. The setting is perfect, the cast is great and the escalating tension is well-wrought. The story takes a couple of sharp turns but never loses its focus, even when you think it might.

This was good enough that I looked into what else the writer had done. Turns out he also wrote the screenplays for Jack Frost and Jack Frost 2: Revenge of the Mutant Killer Snowman. Soooo, never mind!

Here's what those guys are looking at.