Sandy Patterson is your average straight-edge guy who always follows the rules and is a finance manager for a company in Denver. He receives a phone call one morning telling him someone tried to steal his identity and she’s offering a protection service to prevent future attacks. She asks him for his full name, social security number and date of birth to register him for the program and he gladly gives it to her. Turns out, it’s an identity thief named Diana and she’s been doing this for a very long time. With his info, she can print out all of his credit cards and ID with ease due to his ambiguous name.
While at work, the real Sandy is called into Harold Cornish’s office, his boss, to discuss the distribution of bonuses to the higher ups and cutting them amongst the rest of the employees. After that nice bit of news, he receives a call from a salon to confirm a nail appointment for Friday and he finds out its in Florida. Returning to the office and still confused, his coworker Daniel asks him to meet in the parking lot to talk with some others about starting a new company. Because of how terrible his boss is, Sandy agrees to join them. To add even more problems, Sandy goes to get gas and the card is declined due to insufficient funds. The attendant is told by the card company to destroy the card because he has spent a lot of money in Florida. Soon after he’s arrested by a detective for missing a court date in Florida for an assault charge and they quickly release him when seeing Diana’s face in the mug shot. When returning to work the next day, Daniel asks Sandy why the cops are asking if he’s selling drugs around the office. When the detective arrives to the office, he explains that one of Sandy’s cards was used to buy drugs in Florida and the real Sandy is innocent. The police say that nothing can be done with the fraud being right there in state to be charged for her crimes. This is when Sandy takes it upon his self to drive to Florida and bring her back to be charged.
The entire setup for the movie makes for a good comedy. At the helm is the seasoned comedy director Seth Gordon who also directed Horrible Bosses and Four Christmases. The screenplay is written by Craig Mazin who’s also written The Hangover 2 and 3. It stars Jason Bateman, Melissa McCarthy, John Favreau, John Cho, and Amanda Peet. Together, this group could’ve made a colossal hit but it never really took off. There were definitely some funny moments but it felt like there was a little too much improv and not enough scripted jokes. I’m a fan of Melissa McCarthy but she can sometimes go a little far when trying to riff with the other actors.
The picture transfer is encoded in 1080p/AVC and it’s done well. The coloring is clean and even as well as the blacks have minimal to no crushing. Also, the sharpness makes for a crisp and detailed picture which is worthy of the format. Contrasting is separate and none of the fine points get lost at all. However, the picture itself is a little dark throughout so that clean coloring never really takes off. This leaves a sort of lifeless tone that takes a little away from the movie. It is a little disappointing after I found out that the film was shot entirely digital.
The audio is a DTS-HD Mast Audio 5.1 mix that’s a little light yet appropriate for the film. Being that it’s not an action movie or riddled with explosions, the mix tends to be light. It mostly has dialogue with some music so not all of the channels are used all the time aside from a few scenes with ambient noise.
The bonus features are pretty good but I was expecting a really cool gag reel. It was under a minute long.
Supplements
Gag Reel- this is the typical gag reel but it’s incredibly short. It’s a stretch to call it a reel.
The Making of Identity Thief- this is a making of that runs about 17mins long. This gives some info on making the movie.
Trailers- these are HD versions a few Universal movie trailers.
HD Exclusive features
Alternate Takes-these are a few alternate takes of scenes with a ton of improv.
The Skiptracer’s Van Tour- Robert Patrick’s character gives us a little tour for his supped-up van.
Scene Stealing: Capturing the Humor of ‘Identity Thief’- this featurette shows the chemistry between McCarthy and Bateman.
Edition Ratings
R and Unrated
Disc Details
1 BD, 1 DVD
UltraViolet Digital Copy
iTunes digital copy
DVD copy
Video Resolution
1080p MPEG-4 AVC
Audio
English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
French DTS 5.1
Spanish DTS 5.1
Subtitles
English SDH
French
Spanish
Overall this movie has some laughs. From the group of people that were involved in the movie, I think I was expecting a much funnier film. The Blu-ray release is a little sub-par from Universal due to the average transfer and audio mix. In all fairness, this may have been the director’s intention but this shouldn’t discourage anyone from watching the movie. If you like Jason Bateman or Melissa McCarthy comedy, then this is definitely one to see or at least rent it for a funny movie night.
