New On Netflix: Insomnia

Al Pacino is a cop who can’t sleep. It may be because he’s investigating a series of murders in a small town in Alaska that’s currently experiencing the time of year when the sun never sets — the blinding sunlight finds its way into his bedroom, no matter how hard he tries to keep it out. Or it may be because he accidentally murdered his partner (Martin Donovan) and covered it up, and all that guilt — and the fact that the psycho killer he’s been tracking (Robin Williams) knows he did it — is keeping him from getting some shuteye. Or it may be a little (or a lot) of both. Thus is the dilemma in director Christopher Nolan’s skilled remake of the 1997 Norwegian thriller (that starred Stellan Skarsgard), though don’t expect any of the director’s now-trademark visual bombasticness — this is a slow-burn creepfest all the way, and a damn good one.