10 Great Movies Where The Villain Kills The Hero

3. Insomnia

Al Pacino's Detective Will Dormer is far from a flawless hero as he proves when he unwittingly shoots a colleague in pursuit of the film's main killer (played chillingly by Robin Williams) who is about to testify against him in an Internal Affairs case that will likely destroy him. He pins the killing on Williams' Walter Finch and is then pulled into a morally abhorrent scheme by each man to cover up their crimes and take each other down.

In the end, Dormer and Finch meet in a final confrontation that ends with Finch dead from a shotgun blast and Dormer mortally wounded himself. He certainly didn't deserve to get away with his own crimes - though the film refuses to offer a conclusion on his murky brand of justice - but as he dies, it's hard not to feel like he deserved more of a chance of redemption considering the monster he takes down.