Insomnia is a 1997 Norwegian thriller film about a police detective investigating a murder in a town located above the Arctic Circle. The investigation goes horribly wrong when he mistakenly shoots his partner and subsequently attempts to cover up his bungle. The title of the film refers to his inability to sleep, the result of both his guilt and the relentless glare of the midnight sun. Insomnia was the film debut of director Erik Skjoldbjærg. The screenplay was written by Nikolaj Frobenius and Skjoldbjærg, and the soundtrack by Geir Jenssen (alias Biosphere).
Plot
When 17-year-old Tanja is found murdered in the city of Tromsø, far up in the Norwegian Arctic, Kripos police officers Jonas Engström (Stellan Skarsgård) and Erik Vik (Sverre Anker Ousdal) are called in to investigate. Engström is a police inspector formerly with the Swedish Police Service who moved to Norway after being caught having sex with the main witness in one of his cases. Vik is nearing retirement age, and his memory is ailing.
Engström devises a plan to lure the murderer back to the scene of the crime, but the stakeout is blown and the murder suspect flees into the fog. Events take a turn for the worse when the fugitive shoots one of the pursuing police officers, who are unarmed per Norwegian law. Unbeknownst to his colleagues, however, Engström carries a gun from his days in the Swedish police. When he shoots at a shadow in the fog, he learns that he has killed Vik, who had mistakenly run right instead of left as ordered.
Engström initially tells the truth about the shooting, but realizes that everyone assumes that the fugitive shot Vik. He decides to conceal his culpability. When one of Engström's colleagues, Hilde Hagen (Gisken Armand), is assigned to investigate Vik's death, he becomes worried about ballistic fingerprinting and tampers with evidence to support his story. Haunted by guilt and unable to sleep with the midnight sun of the Arctic, Engström becomes increasingly unhinged and starts hallucinating about Vik. Things become even worse when he learns that Tanja's murderer saw him shoot Vik.
Engström learns from one of Tanja's friends that she has been seeing Jon Holt (Bjørn Floberg), a crime novelist. He correctly deduces that Holt killed Tanja, but Holt blackmails Engström with his knowledge of the Vik shooting. The two meet and decide to frame Tanja's boyfriend Eilert for her murder, with Engström later planting Holt's gun under Eilert's bed. However, Hagen is not convinced of Eilert's involvement, and when new evidence emerges, Engström knows that it's only a matter of time before Holt is arrested.
Engström tracks down Holt in the ruins at a waterfront and tries to talk with him. Holt suspects that Engström has come to kill him and holds him at gunpoint. He explains how he killed Tanja in a fit of rage when she dismissed his sexual advances. Holt tries to flee across a pier, but the rotten floorboards give way and cause him to fall into the water below. He hits his head and drowns, while Engström looks on. When he rummages through Holt's nearby house, Engström finds Tanja's dress, which Holt removed before dumping the body. With Holt dead, and having found definitive proof that he was the murderer, the case is closed.
Just before he leaves town, Engström is visited by Hagen, who shows him a cartridge case found at the site where Vik was shot. She notes that it is a Norma case, which Engström confirms is a brand used by the Swedish police. Engström expects Hagen to arrest him, but she instead lets him off the hook and she leaves the cartridge case.
Cast
Themes
Engström is unable to sleep, partly due to relentless guilt over recent and ongoing misdeeds, and partly due to the never-ending sunlight, which serves as an outward representation of that guilt. The film has been described as turning film noir conventions on their heads by using, in place of shadows and darkness, relentless sunshine and ubiquitous bright white fog to convey guilt and disorientation. The film noir theme is emphasized, as the film follows many of the other conventions from this genre. For instance, the lone detective who doesn't follow rules, but develops a personal interest in the case and establishes connections with the villain.
Engström strives to maintain an image of professionalism and of being in control. In actuality, he repeatedly loses control and succumbs to his own sexual desires. His caressing of Tanja's body at her autopsy could be described as either fatherly or carnal, but his encounters with Tanja's friend Frøya, and Ane, the receptionist, are all sexual in nature. His decision to stay and watch Eilert have sex with his new girlfriend defines him as the sexually frustrated voyeur. This characteristic, along with the accidental killing of a friend, aligns him with Holt.
Engström has moved from Sweden to Norway to escape the past, but throughout the film he is unable to put his Swedish nationality behind him: He doesn't speak Norwegian properly, at one point addressing an entire classroom in a Swedish dialect they do not understand. As a former Swedish police officer, Engström is accustomed to wearing a firearm, and brings one with him in violation of Norwegian police procedure.
A common misconception outside Scandinavia (possibly due to translation problems) is that Engström is a Swedish police officer aiding Norwegian police, in a cross-border collaboration. This is wrong; Engström is a Swede employed in the Norwegian police. It is quite common for Swedes to move to neighbouring Norway to find work and vice versa.
Remake
A remake of the film was directed by Christopher Nolan. The film, featuring Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hilary Swank, was released in 2002.
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