With amnesia becoming something of a mainstay for the film script, those using it have to tread carefully to avoid being pedestrian. Mémoires Affectives (or Looking for Alexander as it is sometimes billed) manages to be innovative enough to get away with it.

Alexander (Dupuis) wakes up from a coma after his life support is switched off in an apparent murder attempt. Remembering only random images, he attempts to piece his past together using the testimony of an estranged wife, a former lover, a distant daughter and a policewoman (Zacharie) attempting to discover the person who nearly killed him.

Memory loss as represented in the movies is usually the condition of action heroes (The Bourne Identity, Paycheck) and hapless romantics (Overboard, 50 First Dates). Given, Alexander is perhaps the first veterinarian to be afflicted , but as source material amnesia has been done before. Nevertheless, it remains a useful means to explore identity while having the audience empathise with the protagonist's confusion, and films should not be written off for including it. They should, however, back up the use of this tired mechanism by being skilled enough avoid straying into soap opera territory and be at least a little innovative.

Mémoires Affectives achieves this on both levels. Leclerc shoots the film excellently, using Quebec 's the snow-covered wilderness to mirror a Alexander's mind state. Something added to further by a moving score. Leads Dupuis and Thauvette, as Alexander's brother, give solid performances with Zacharie's detective Maksoud the stand out achievement.

In terms of narrative, Mémoires Affectives is of one of the more serious movies dealing with memory loss like Memento and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Like them it uses it as an enabler for existential crisis, where powers of recall are set against assumptions of fact. As Alexander's psychiatrist tells him: “Truth is a notion as abstract as memory”. Does Alexander want to rebuild a flawed life, and, more importantly, do his loved ones? To some extent this is nothing new, but Leclerc's approach is different in having his protagonist experience conflicting versions of events consecutively. This splicing together of opposing renditions of Alexander's life gives the film a genuine momentum while asking the question: is ignorance bliss?

Nor is Leclerc unwilling to explore ideas of memory transference and collective unconsciousness, in a denouement that the audience may find slightly obtuse. Other films have used amnesia to greater advantage but Leclerc's enthusiasm to push the boundaries is duly noted.