Ten little, nine little, eight little Indians ...
Seven little, six little, five little Indians ...
Four little, three little, two little Indians ...
... One little Indian boy.

Creepy little children's tune, if you ask me. Maybe it's because I remember the 1974 adaptation to the Agatha Christie murder mystery, And then there were None. There have been a few before it, and following it, but the Ten Little Indians tale is a classic. While the initial plot sounds all too familiar to And Then There Were None, make no mistake ... the new thriller, Identity, is very different. In fact, if this was an Agatha Christie adaptation or novel, you'd never see me write about it here ... this isn't the Portal of Mystery.

No ... Identity ... is something else altogether.

Put up ten stranded motorists in a desert motel on a very stormy night, with one seedy motel owner, and whomever is the last one standing ... wins. Or maybe they lose, who knows ... especially as the characters desperately try to piece together whatever terror has tied them together to this specific place, this particular night ... and wants to kill them off, one at a time. Could it be one of them?

• Ed, the bored limo driver - John Cusack (Stephen King's Stand By Me, and in next year's remake of The Stepford Wives)
• Caroline, the movie star - Rebecca De Mornay (remakes of classics: Edgar Allen Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Alexandre Dumas's The Three Musketeers, and Stephen King's The Shining)
• Rhodes, the corrections officer - Ray Liotta (No Escape and Hannibal)
• Robert, the convict - Jake Busey (Hider in the House, The Frighteners, Contact, Starship Troopers, and Hitcher 2: I've Been Waiting)
• Paris, the ex-prostitute - Amanda Peet (Animal Room, Hackers 2: Takedown)
• Lou, miserable young husband - William Lee Scott (Gattica, and later this year The Butterfly Effect)
• Ginny, unhappy young wife - Clea DuVall (The Faculty, The Astronaut's Wife, John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars, and HBO's Creature Feature - How to Make a Monster)
• George York - John C. McGinley (Highlander 2: The Quickening, Dean R. Koontz's Intensity and Sole Survivor)
• Alice York - played by Leila Kenzle
• Timothy York - played by Bret Loehr
• Larry, the motel owner - John Hawkes (Scary Movie, Freaked, Night of the Scarecrow, From Dusk Till Dawn, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, and Steven Spielberg's epic mini-series Taken)

There will be so many twists and turns on this rainy night, I wouldn't even bother trying to help these folks solve this horror/thriller. Producer's Stuart M. Besser and Cathy Konrad (makers of the Scream films) have shot several different endings for this movie ... so prepare for a wicked surprise.

Release Date: April 21, 2003

For a dark and creepy flash-amated look at the new film, check out the Sony Pictures web site:

http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/identity/index.html