Denis' mid-career masterpiece is based on the shocking true story of Thierry Paulin, a gay, black, HIV-positive drug dealer, transvestite and serial killer who preyed on elderly Parisian women during the mid-1980s. The mysterious, sensitive-- but appropriately troubling-- exploration of Paulin's crimes offered by I Can't Sleep is, however, worlds away from such a sensationalistic description of the facts. By refracting the story through the point of view of a young Lithuanian woman, an illegal immigrant struggling to make ends meet, Denis instead offers an offbeat vision of the modern world as a fragile community of outsiders whose search for financial, emotional and sexual sustenance remains under the menacing eye of ubiquitous and frighteningly impersonal authorities.

In an arrestingly filmed interview (with the questions omitted), Denis offers a spirited and insightful discussion of her films and career. Exploring her first few films in illuminating detail, she also explains her fascinating ideas about filmmaking itself—lighting, sound, editing—and about such other filmmakers as Renoir and Ozu.