Hey folks, Harry here with a look at the remake of the wonderful INSOMNIA, a project that on so many levels seemed to be the most pointless thing I could think of... Until Christopher Nolan attached himself to it.... then I became fascinated. Here's a look at the second test screening we've heard about... this one in San Diego...
Hey Harry...
Just finished seeing Christopher Nolan's follow-up to Memento, screened in the hometown of a particularly popular summer comic-con. I'm a first-time reviewer, so just call me Chuck Cunningham. Here's the scoop.
Insomnia stars Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank, some serious Oscar-type power. Pacino is Will Dormer, a veteran LA cop called to a small Alaska town to help solve the murder of local teenager. He and his partner,Eckhardt (don't know his name, but he plays Dana Delany's husband on Pasadena)are feeling the heat of an Internal Affairs investigation in LA. (More on that later) Swank plays Ellie Burr, an enthusiastic new detective, and Paul Dooley is her boss. Nicky Katt (Boston Public) is another local cop (HORRIBLE mustache). Anyway, Dormer is the expert, and right away we're told this, and shown (he puts on a show at the autopsy). Very quickly, they find a backpack belonging to the dead girl, then set a trap for her killer. The trap doesn't work, though, and they end up chasing the suspect through the fog. In the chase, Dormer accidentally kills his partner, though, which poses a problem. The partner thinks it's intentional, and says so in his dying breath. (Earlier he told Dormer he's going to make a deal with IA, leaving him out in the cold.) What was really an accident looks like a murder, at least it will be to IA. Simple, though, is Dormer's solution. Dormer blames the killing on the suspect who got away.
One problem. The suspect sees the whole thing. Now he has something on the cop chasing him. We know this through the first in a series of chilling phone calls, with a voice unmistakingly belonging to Robin Williams (Finch). Blackmail, of a sort, ensues. Finch tries to have Dormer help him pin the crime on the dead girl's boyfriend Randy (played by Jonathan Jackson).
So Dormer is faced with a dilemma. He knows who did it. But how does he prove it without implicating himself in covering up his partner's death? Plus, the investigation quickly points to Finch. How can he slow the investigation down, get the bad guy, and keep himself out of jail? Plus, he's wearing down: he can't sleep due to Alaska's white nights, adding to the strain (hence the title). No spoilers here..you'll have to see it yourself!
The performances were very good (Pacino, excellent, Williams, very menacing/psychotic; he would make a good comic book villain) although Swank was just OK. There were a couple of throwaway supporting roles (Maura Tiereney from ER comes and goes, and doesn't do much) but the pacing was good, the scenery excellent and the story really moved. The print we saw looked pretty final, not much in the credits dept, but sound was good; a few scenes could be a little shorter, but they're almost there. A few producer-types were in attendance and the questionaire was extensive enough to seem this was almost a finished product.
Again, this is a good, if somewhat conventional follow-up to Memento.No sophomore slump for Nolan.
-Chuck Cunningham
