“Identity Thief” released early this February stars Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy. The story follows a business man who lives a mediocre life and his quest to hunt down the woman who stole his identity.

The story goes that Bateman’s character, Sandy Patterson, answers a phone call and receives devastating news from a saccharine sweet voice who informs him that his personal information had been compromised.

She asks him for his social security number among many other personal facts; Patterson as a competent man working at an investment firm should have seen the red flags but uses no judgment and relents easily. The woman rejoices at the ease of her scam and creates multiple credit cards under Patterson’s name.

The road trip starts because Patterson is forced to retrieve Melissa McCarthy’s character later named Diana in a cross country road trip to prove his innocence. Diana is one hundred percent perceived as not a threat to Patterson. This is because she’s a woman, she’s large, and she’s unstable (which honestly should make her more of a danger).

However, no one bats an eye to learn that he’s going on his own to hunt down a criminal who not only cons people out of their identity but also gets arrested for a variety of reasons including a narcotics deal gone bad.

Melisa McCarthy’s over the top comical personality and appearance makes her crimes a joke because her character is a joke. This makes sense in a comedy film but when you have to force your audience to like a criminal with no conscience, it starts to feel sad and artificial.

The movie is not really a comedy with very few jokes and unlikable characters. It proves to be lazy, relying mostly on McCarthy’s delivery and its attempt at slapstick comedy.

I find it interesting how they approached McCarthy’s weight throughout the film; if a thin woman was playing Diana the movie would have been a romantic comedy where the underwhelming Mrs. Patterson wouldn’t have existed.

Bottom line, this movie is not worth paying money to see as it’s not a hysterical comedy as it’s advertised. I wouldn’t say it’s the worst comedy I’ve ever seen as I laughed a few times but it didn’t blow me away with its plot or characters.

It felt flat and lame because of how it just dragged on and left the viewer wanting more and never delivering.