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Grade: B+

Verdict: Call this razor-sharp murder mystery ''Sleepless in Alaska.''

Details: Starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank. Directed by Christopher Nolan. Rated R for language and violence. One hour, 52 minutes.

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Review: “Memento” was a tough act to follow. Director Christopher Nolan's riveting 2001 film was a technically and thematically challenging cinematic tour de force.

But that was just an art movie that became a sleeper hit. “Insomnia,” a shadowy, adroit murder mystery, is Nolan's introduction to the big leagues. It's a Hollywood movie with a Hollywood cast of Oscar winners: Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank.

It even has a Hollywood ending. Or at least it feels that way. The big scene granted one of the stars in the last sceneat the end doesn't seem in synch with the moody hour and three-quarters that precede it, or the 1998 Norwegian film on which “Insomnia” is based. Somehow, you can't really see that kind of emotional punch-up coming from the Scandinavians.

Otherwise, “Insomnia” is a deftly entertaining film, smartly played and smartly directed.

Something's fishy in the small Alaskan town of Nightmute, which claims to be the “Halibut Fishing Capital of the World.” A teenage girl has been beaten and murdered.

Nightmute isn't the sort of place where people get murdered, brutally or not. So they call in the pros: Will Dormer (Pacino), a legend in the Los Angeles Police Department, and his partner, Hap (Martin Donovan). Though they're friends, there seems to be some tension between them. It might have something to do with the fact that Internal Affairs is investigating their department. Hap is ready to cooperate — which bothers Will, though he has a long-established reputation as a good cop. Then there's the local cop (Swank), who's helping them out; she has hero-worshipped Will since graduating from the police academy.

Tracking down a killer is the sort of thing the L.A. guys are used to doing; what they can't handle is the relentless Alaskan summer, where it's light at 3 in the morning. Will is especially affected, to the point where he's raging against the non-dying of the light. By the end of the movie, he hasn't slept for six days. But is it the light or something else that's keeping him awake?

Swank quotes the hero cop to himself: A good cop can't sleep because a piece of the puzzle is missing, and a bad cop can't sleep because of his conscience.

Williams doesn't enter the picture until 30 minutes in, and by then you'll probably have some idea of where he fits in the scheme of things. He plays Walter Finch, a hack writer of obscure crime novels who's obsessed with cops. In this case, that means Will, which leads to some of the cleverest cat-and-mouse games in recent memory. Especially riveting is an interrogation scene in which each diabolically tops the other.

Nightmute may be bathed in near 24/7 daylight, but most of “Insomnia” takes place in dark, claustrophobic rooms. When Nolan takes us outside, to show us a panoramic view of the Alaskan wilderness, we feel doubly cramped by the interior scenes. It's disorienting, and it's meant to be. The claustrophobia is brought to a near-hysterical level in a scene where Pacino and Williams chase each other across a log float and Pacino, terrifyingly, becomes trapped underwater, his arms getting crushed by the immense logs as he tries to claw his way back to air.

Nolan and Pacino cannily convey the fallout of sleeplessness: the confusion, the heaviness, the bleariness. More importantly, except for a lapse or two, Pacino reins himself in. Instead of the bloated histrionics of “Scent of a Woman,” he gives the part the same careful character shadings he used in “Donnie Brasco.”

The real proof of Nolan's skill with actors, however, is Williams, who's been told incessantly that he needs to play against type. You can barely place that eerily familiar face, and his Mork-ish physical energy has been rechanneled into something jittery and unsettling.

No, “Insomnia” isn't as good as “Memento,” but who really expected it to be? But it gives Nolan a chance to prove he can survive going Hollywood and still keep something of his distinctiveness from being erased. In a season full of summer-movie dumbness, “Insomnia” is a movie to seek out.

— Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution