In Identity, a psychological thriller set in the Nevada desert in 2003, a rainstorm floods the roads near a remote motel where 10 people are stranded and start getting murdered one by one. Three of them – George (John C. McGinley), Alice (Leila Kenzie), and Timmy York (Bret Loehr) – get a flat tire and pull over to the side of the road. In an almost laughable scene while standing there in the rain Alice gets hit by a limo driven by Ed Dakota (John Cusack) who is chauffeuring Caroline Suzanne (Rebecca DeMornay), an older actress.

They drive to the motel and tell Larry Washington (John Hawkes) to call for help, but Paris Nevada (Amanda Peet) had just accidentally hit the phone lines. Ginny (Clea DuVall) and Lou Isiana (William Lee Scott) pick up Paris and Ed after the limo gets stuck, but by then both ends of the roads are flooded, so they’re all forced to the hotel. The final two who are forced to the hotel are Officer Rhodes (Ray Liotta) and his prisoners that he’s transferring Robert Maine (Jake Busey). The audience learns about each of these characters between flashbacks of a hearing for Malcolm Rivers (Pruitt Taylor Vince), a serial killer sentenced to be executed the next day. The flashes in and out made me question what the connection between him
and the ten people was and ultimately just confused me. In the beginning, Malcolm is heard saying something that he repeats a couple of times during the movie: “As I was going up the stairs, I met a man who wasn’t there. He wasn’t there again today. I wish I wish he’d go away.” Each member of the group gets murdered one by one. This sends the group into a frenzy to find out which one of them is the killer. With each dead body that is discovered, there is a room key. The first person to be killed had a nine and it counted down from there.

After hearing some of Malcolm’s diaries, we find out that he has an extreme case of dissociative identity disorder and has 11 different personalities. Then it all started to click for me, the eleven people at the motel are the eleven personalities and the motel scene is just made up in his head to kill the personality that actually was the serial killer. There are a lot of twists and turns and some expected surprises. This is a great psychological film and the effects used in the film look great for a movie made in the early 2000s, although it is laughable at parts I still would consider it a must-see for those who like thrillers.