Identity - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Identity



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


AV NIRVANA is member and reader-supported. When you purchase an item using our links, we might earn an affiliate commission.
​

Movie
Have you ever watched a movie before that you thought you hadn’t watched, but started getting suspicious when you start calling out twists in the film? Then when you get to the end you suddenly realize “wait, a minute! I’ve seen this before!”. That was how this viewing of Identity was for me. I blind bought the Blu-ray back when the Blu-ray format was still in its infancy (it was the first year releases of the format) and thought I had never watched it. At least, that’s what I thought when I checked out Arrow’s 4K UHD release from a couple of weeks back. It wasn’t till about 30 minutes in that I started guessing a few twists before they happened, and by the time the final act was unfurling, I was having this eerie sensation that some of this was TOO familiar. But it wasn’t till the last 60 seconds of the film that the ending came flooding back to me in full, and I realized that I probably had seen this between 2007 and 2010, then never pulled it off my shelf again. Which is a sad thing considering how good of a film it was.

While most people associate James Mangold with The Wolverine, Logan, 3:10 to Yuma, or (god forbid) Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, his 2003 follow-up film to Kate & Leopold was a hard-hitting mystery/horror film that featured a star-studded cast and tight storytelling that keeps the audience engaged till the very end. Our story starts with Doctor Malick (Alfred Molina) rushing a judge out of bed to hear new evidence in the case of Malcolm Rivers (Pruitt Taylor Vince), a man whose execution is scheduled for the next day, regarding his capability to stand trial due to mental incompetence. But simultaneously, the film jumps directly in with the front-and-center storyline, as a group of people are all stranded at a rundown motel in the middle of nowhere, with the roads washed out in either direction.

First on the screen is Ed (John Cusack), an ex cop turned bodyguard to his aging actress boss Caroline (Rebecca De Mornay). They’ve just hit a passenger on the side of the road (Clea DuVall), leaving father George (John C. McGinley) and little Timmy (Bret Loehr) grieving the life of their mother/spouse, who is slipping away as they speak. Add in Police Officer Rhodes (Ray Liotta), who is stuck there transporting a criminal (Jake Busey), a hooker who wants a place to stay (Amanda Peet), and the motel manager Larry (John Hawkes), and this motley crew is on edge.

And it’s not long before things start popping off. Tempers are high, and soon our illustrious actress has been murdered, with her head stuffed inside a dryer in the motel. And that’s when things start to get “weird”. At first, things are blamed on the prisoner that Rhodes is transporting, but once he’s caught,t the weirdness doesn’t end. A young married couple ends up with the husband murdered when the killer wasn’t even in the vicinity. And soon Ed and Rhodes start to realize that something is amiss in their world. A world that seems to be locked firmly in place right at the heart of the motel, and is the very reason why they’re trapped there to this day.

I will say this. If you’re remotely good at picking up telegraphed clues, even if you’ve never seen the film before, you can start to pick up on the massive reveal that happens at around the 1-hour point. It’s a twist that is clever enough on its own, but spoiled slightly by the title, as well as verbal cues that aren’t THAT heavily hidden. But, in my opinion, that is meant as a red herring for the audience to latch on to and distract them from the final twist that happens in the last 1-2 minutes of the movie. It’s a feint, a deflection. A distraction,n you might say. One that allows the audience to think that they’ve figured things out, and then get the rug pulled out from under them at the very end. Naturally, I’m not going to spoil either twist, as it needs to be seen to be felt properly, but this is such a fun movie that even the easily (or comparatively easily) seen first twist is a fantastic experience, making the second twist an even bigger gut punch as the credits start to roll.

I won’t say that Identity is the best film of Mangold’s career, as it is most certainly not. But it is still a well-told thriller that feels like it’s from a bygone era of filmmaking that we just don’t see today. It’s filled with a who’s who cast of characters, ranging from Amanda Peet to 80s stars John Cusack and Ray Liotta, and features enough twists, turns, and sucker punches to keep the audience guessing the whole way. It’s thematically dark, texturally bleak, and both John Cusack and Pruitt Taylor Vince turn in stellar performances in this split-story film.




Rating:

Rated R for strong violence and language




4K Video: Video:

According to Arrow’s info booklet, Identity was presented in 4K with Dolby Vision, after having been restored by Sony Pictures Entertainment and scanned in at 4K 16/bit from the original 35 mm negative at Roundabout Entertainment. Then color graded at Roundabout with colorist Christian Lamie and approved by Director James Mangold.

All in all, this is a superb-looking 4K disc, absolutely blasting the aging 2007 Blu-ray out of the water. The old Blu-ray was a looker back in the day, but mastering and processing techniques are leagues better than 19 years ago, and the new Dolby Vision enhancements really pull out the detail levels as the film takes place 95% at night in the dark and rain. Long gone are the banding and crush, and instead we have rich and deep black levels with a little blue and green color grading (not a ton, just that light tinge that was popular in the early 2000s), while the couple of outdoor shots are heavily sepia-graded. Fine details are superb all the way around, with a nice grain structure that isn’t obtrusive, but still true to form for modern 35mm film stock. Sure, it can clump and look sticky every ONCE in a while, but not often. Overall, this is a stunning-looking image.








Audio:

Sony’s old 1080p Blu-ray from 19 years ago sported an uncompressed LPCM 5.1 mix, while this new 4K UHD release from Arrow gets the 5.1 DTS-HD MA treatment, which is mostly just a re-encode. I noticed some minor level boosting in the DTS-HD MA mix over the LPCM, and sometimes felt like the surrounds had a bit more clarity, but that could simply have been my ears and the placebo effect. Effectively, this track is almost sonically identical to the LPCM track, and is still a treat almost 20 years later. Thunder crashing in the background, the roar of an engine as a heavy pickup truck runs someone over. The light and soft drizzle of rain in the background. All of these ambient discrete sounds make full use of the entire 6 channels at our disposal, making this an atmospheric treat. Bass is deep and throaty, and dialog crisp as can be in the center channel. This is simply a perfect mix that shows that Atmos is not the end-all, be-all of the home theater world.

.





Extras:

• Theatrical Cut (1:30:01) and Extended Cut (1:31:09)
• Audio Commentaries
-- Commentary by James Mangold
-- Commentary by Michael Cooney
• I Met a Man Who Wasn't There
• Producing Identity
• Deleted Scenes
• Storyboard Comparisons
• Theatrical Trailer
• Image Gallery

Final Score: ​

I really like Identity, and I’m not sure why I let roughly 17-19 years go by before watching it again. Arrow’s 4K release is quite pleasing, with a very large uptick in video quality and a slightly nicer audio mix. Not to mention the plethora of extras that they have included. Again, I must reiterate that while Identity is not going to rise to the level of Rosemary’s Baby, or even some of the 90s Morgan Freeman thrillers, it is still a very high-quality film that still works some 20 years later. Fans will love this release, and newbies definitely should check the film out in its best quality to date. Highly recommended.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet, John Hawkes, Alfred Molina, John C. McGinley, Jake Busey, Pruitt Taylor Vince
Directed by: James Mangold
Written by: Michael Cooney
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1
Subtitles: English SDH
Studio: Arrow
Rated: R
Runtime: 90 Minutes (Theatrical) / 91 Minutes (Extended)
Blu-ray Release Date: August 25th, 2026

Recommendation: Highly Recommended