On July 3rd of 2003 a man walked into a Coney Island police station with absolutely no idea who he was. No name, no identity, no past, nothing at all to tell him about himself; all of it wiped away mysteriously. He was a man without a past, without a future and with no present to try and hold on to. He was an enigma, his history was trapped somewhere inside his mind and no key to unlock the answers to make him whole.

“Unknown White Male” is the story of Doug Bruce, a British stockbroker working in New York who, for no apparent reason, lost 37 years of his life one fateful evening. Filmmaker Rupert Murray knew the old Doug, was his friend back in England, and after hearing of what happened to him decided that his story provided the foundations for an intriguing documentary. It recounts the weeks and months as Doug tried to reconstruct a life he knew nothing about. Music, art, friends, family, work, love, movies, all of it was now a mystery to the main, and like a baby taking its first steps into a new world Doug, too, had to go on a voyage of self-discovery to, not only know his past, but to know his future.

It is, needless to say, an interesting documentary. I found it impossible to think no one would not find Doug’s amnesiac story engaging, just the thought of losing every single part of what makes us who we are, our memories, terrifying enough to keep most people awake at night. Watching Doug put the pieces together, seeing him try to reconnect with family and friends he doesn’t remember, is heart-wrenching, the emotional avalanche he puts himself through just to gain a foothold on his life truly astonishing.

There are problems, however. I saw “Unknown White Male” almost a year ago at the Seattle International Film Festival and, ironically, I completely forgot I even saw it. If the film’s local publicist hadn’t reminded me it was coming out, I probably would have missed writing a review. In fact, so little of this feature stuck with me I had to go watch it again at another press screening, had to be reminded of how powerful and profound much of what Doug went through, is still going through, really is.

Why did this happen? Well, for one thing, the first third is astonishingly inert. After you get over the initial shock of hearing about Doug’s amnesia nothing that happens through this portion resonates very much. Murray presents a cavalcade of talking heads, and as much fun as it is seeing people far smarter than me saying, “I don’t know,” over and over again the novelty quickly wears off once a viewer gets the idea there are no rational reasons for the man’s memory loss. Also, Murray’s digital cinematography, while obviously meant to give the illusion of what it must have felt like for Doug in those early hours, is disconcerting and gave me a splitting headache. An image can only twist and turn and bend back into itself so often before it becomes annoying, Murray crossing that line almost from the very first frame.

Yet, on second viewing (and after looking over my notes from my first experience with the film) I cannot help but be struck with how much Doug’s story truly shook me up. Oddly, near identical things struck me on both viewings. Over and over again I jotted down bits and pieces in my notes about Doug; about his meeting his family in England, about his initial photographed conversation with the director, about how charismatic and steadfast he became as the movie went on; many of them the exact same thoughts from my first experience with the film nearly eight long months ago. His story, whether I knew it consciously or not, stuck with me, speaking to me on an even more intimate level during that second trip to the multiplex.