Spoilers ahead forInsomnia.
WatchingInsomniais a glimpse into an alternate universe whereChristopher Nolanis a journeyman director who doesn’t really care much about themes and just makes handsomely crafted pictures with talented actors. A remake ofErik Skjoldbjærg’s 1997 Norweigian film of the same name, Nolan’s movie technically follows the same premise and some similar plot beats, but comes to the exact opposite conclusion that made Skjoldbjærg’s movie so riveting. Nolan attempts to force some of his favorite themes about truth, lies, and control into the picture, but mostlyInsomniais a drag that makes for a nice demo reel to show that Nolan could handle a studio picture and is rightly forgotten among the auteur’s filmography.
The plot hasAl Pacinoplaying LAPD detective Will Dormer, who, along with his partner Hap Eckhart (Martin Donovan), is basically exiled to a small remote Alaskan fishing village of Nightmute to investigate the murder of a teenage girl. For Will, this assignment isn’t because he’s a famous detective who has solved some notable cases, but rather because he and Hap are being investigated by internal affairs, and the powers-that-be want to get Will away from the spotlight. When he arrives in Nightmute, it seems like they’ve got a fairly direct line to catching their killer, but a bungled sting operation leads to the killer escaping and Will accidentally shooting and killing Hap during the pursuit. The twist is that the killer, Walter Finch (Robin Williams), saw the whole thing, so while Will is busy covering up the accidental shooting (which may have looked intentional because Hap was going to talk to internal affairs) and fending off eager detective Ellie Burr (Hilary Swank), he also has an awkward relationship with the soft-spoken Finch. During this time, in a place where it’s always daylight, Will suffers from insomnia.
These are the similar beats of the original movie, although Nolan’s version adds the extra layer of the IA investigation, which feels like a way to hold the audience’s hand through the question of “Why wouldn’t Will just admit it was an accident?” But where Nolan’s version falters is because it’s obsessed with motivation. For Nolan’sInsomnia, intent is everything, and it makes for a crucial distinction between a killing and a murder. But ultimately, that feels like the film getting bogged down in a semantic distinction rather than really exploring intention in any meaningful way.
The remake’s big contribution, and where Nolan emerges most clearly, is that Will is actually guilty of what he’s being accused of by internal affairs. Like Leonard Shelby and other Nolan protagonists, Will is lying to himself and using that comforting lie that the ends justify the means. This is also where the film is at its most interesting as it tries to thread the needle between justice and truth. For Will, in his confession to Ellie near the film’s climax, he reveals that he forged evidence to convict a man who he knew to be guilty but was at risk of getting away. The randomness of the universe was about to impose chaos, so he created a lie that would tell the truth. His means of getting justice were based on a lie, but since Will knew the man to be guilty, justice would ultimately be served on a lie rather than the truth, and that ethos carries over to why Will is trying to cover up Hap’s killing—because the truth may not be as good as a lie.
That’s an interesting thread, but Nolan doesn’t really get to pull at it until he reachesThe Dark Knightwhere Batman and Gordon create a lie about Harvey Dent’s death. InInsomnia, the idea works in a vacuum, but it strains against the plot beats of the original story, and that original story is at cross-purposes with Nolan’s view. In Nolan’s world, you can, through lies and misdirection, impose order on chaos. It may not always be honest and there will be a reckoning, but we tell stories because we need to be fooled in some way. But Skjoldbjærg’s film has a far more nihilistic view of the world.
For Skjoldbjærg’sInsomnia, truth and lies are meaningless because everything is meaningless. His protagonist, Jonas Engstrom (Stellan Skarsgard), is haunted not by his actions (there’s no IA investigation or particularly camaraderie between he and his partner), but by the fact that there may be no repercussions whatsoever. The world is pure randomness. In Nolan’sInsomnia, Walter sees that as a way to bond with Will—they’ve both killed, but Walter believes both killings were accidental and therefore aren’t tantamount to murder (the film needs Walter to be unambiguously evil, so Will counters that he beat the teenage girl to death for ten minutes whereas in the Norwegian version the victim accidentally dies after some rough foreplay). But in Skjoldbjærg’sInsomnia, the men are truly bonded not by long phone calls (Will and Walter talk on the phoneso much) but because they’ve both come face-to-face with an inconsequential universe. Jonas can’t sleep not because he feels guilty, but because he’s learning that there’s no repercussion for any vile thing he might do.
A Hollywood version was never going to be as nasty as the Norwegian version. For example, in Skjoldbjærg’sInsomnia, Jonas lures a stray dog and kills it to get a forged bullet for the file whereas Will shoots a dog that’s already dead. That may seem like a small distinction, but the originalInsomniais all about vile human behavior in a careless universe, which makes for a far more interesting movie because it challenges its audience about their own morality. If there are no cosmic consequences and the system can be gamed, then why should we act morally? The film offers no easy answers and a haunting conclusion. But Nolan’s version is fairly straightforward. Will, having done something wrong, learns that lying is bad and that you may achieve justice through sacrifice (he dies) and violence (he and Walter shoot each other at the same time).
Perhaps a remake was never going to work for Nolan since his ideas tend to dominate his pictures, and grafting them onto another filmmaker’s work would only create a schizophrenic result. The purpose ofInsomniaisn’t to dive into Nolan’s thinking, but to show a major studio, Warner Bros., that he could make the jump from independents to Hollywood features. By that metric,Insomniais a success as Nolan made a film that’s technically sound and does nail Will’s weariness and exhaustion while consciously avoiding the stylistic choices Skjoldbjærg made in his movie. Showing he could be trusted with a budget, Nolan then proceeded to casually reinvent blockbuster storytelling for the remainder of the decade.
