Film Review: Identity Thief

There’s nothing worse than realising 2 minutes into a film that you’re in for 2 hours of pain

I went into this movie with good intentions and a bottle of wine. My gut told me something wasn’t right here, but on account of my love for Arrested Development and Melissa McCarthy being the flavor of the month, it was enough to warrant a viewing. Boy was I wrong. There’s nothing worse than realising 2 minutes into a film that you’re in for 2 hours of pain. I poured myself a large glass and soldiered on.

Identity Thief tells the terrible story of Sandy Patterson (Jason Bateman), an early 40’s type with a loving wife, loving children, and a job with really shitty pay. Any real sympathy for this guy was lost in the opening scene where he stupidly gives all his personal details over the phone to a woman claiming to be from an identity protection service. Shock horror, she ain’t  Meet Diane (Melissa McCarthy), the title character who lies, steals and shops for a living. After she runs wild with Sandy’s credit cards for a few days in Florida, all police trails lead back to the real Sandy Patterson, half way across the country.

Sandy is confronted by police one morning who need to search his workplace for drugs after someone was caught using Sandy’s cards trying to buy some (Since when can you use credit cards to buy drugs?). Even though the police are aware of his identity being stolen, they can’t do anything unless the identity thief is present. But wait, they won’t go get the thief? Uh-oh looks like Sandy’s in for a road trip!

The rest of this movie plays out with no laughs, no plausibility, and no hope. It’s Sandy’s job to get Diane across the country in 5 days or else he loses his new job, all the while trying to avoid any shenanigans along the way, and yes there are plenty, all dumb. A string of cameo’s enter the fray. The Asian from Harold and Kumar, The gay guy from Modern Family, and the bad robot from Terminator 2, T-100. Even Mike from Breaking Bad shows up. Glad to see he’s getting some work after Walt popped him last season.

Director Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses, King of Kong) had no hope here of turning a shit screenplay into a watchable movie. Especially when screenwriter Craig Mazin’s funniest material centers on the fact that a male has the name Sandy. Sure he had to make it plausible because a woman stole his identity but it’s something he feels so insecure about that he masks it with humour in 4 separate scenes, trying desperately to get laughs from the fact that Sandy is more a girl’s name, than a guys. And the idea that we’re supposed to feel any sympathy for a character who steals other people’s identities because she’s never had one of her own is just shitty writing and shows what little regard Mazin has for his audience. The acting? Well you can’t really blame Bateman and McCarthy for such terrible dialogue when they didn’t write it… But they would have read it, so on account of that, yes some respect has been lost. I found McCarthy’s scene-stealer in This is 40 funnier than anything in this movie. The only laugh came from an exaggerated sex scene where McCarthy’s Diane character screams, “Break my hip! Break my fucking hip!”. That’s as good as it gets. Thank God for the wine.

Identify Thief is out in Australia April 4th.

IDENTITY THIEF
Directed by: Seth Gordon
Written by: Craig Mazin
Cast: Jason Bateman, Melissa McCarthy, Jon Favreau
Released by: Universal