Hatchet reporter Miriam Smallman shares her latest movie experience.
“Identity Thief” (2013)
★★✰✰✰
What if you awoke one day to find your bank accounts drained, a warrant out for your arrest, and your job on the line — and you had no idea how it happened? If your identity is stolen, you are essentially at the mercy of whoever holds the cards now—literally.
This is precisely what happens to Sandy Bigelow Patterson (Jason Bateman), your average good guy: a businessman with a wife, two kids and a modest home in Denver. Everything seems to be going well for Patterson — until Diana (Melissa McCarthy), a con artist living it up in Florida, steals Sandy’s identity and sends his finances spiraling out of control. With the loss of his job at stake and local police unable to help him, Sandy sets off to Winter Park, Florida, to find Diana and fix his heinous situation. Wrangling Diana turns out to be harder than Sandy predicted, and together they embark on a cross-country trip filled with obstacles and life lessons.
The nearly two-hour-long film served mainly as a vehicle to promote Melissa McCarthy’s comedic antics, which brought her acclaim in Bridesmaids. If anything can be said about McCarthy’s performance, it is that she commits to her role completely. Her character’s flaws and moments of weakness managed to turn this over-the-top trainwreck of a character into a sympathetic human being. Bateman’s Sandy becomes a likeable foil to McCarthy’s Diana as the film progresses, but even with a variety of supporting characters, Identity Thief was undoubtedly McCarthy’s time to shine.
Identity Thief has all the requisite clichés of an R-rated comedy — a high-speed chase, a raucous sexual encounter, sentimental moments of vulnerability and a heartwarming conclusion, but is primarily driven by its star power. Without McCarthy, the film would be a flop. Fans of McCarthy will leave satisfied, but for the rest, Identity Thief is your run-of-the-mill string of slapstick jokes and ridiculous plot lines that is likely not worth your $10.
Director: Seth Gordon
Genre: Comedy
Cast: Melissa McCarthy, Jason Bateman.
Release Date: Feb. 8
