Vital Signs (Les Signes vitaux)

When her grandmother's death forces her to return to Quebec City, Simone (Marie-Hélène Bellavance) has no idea that her life as a Harvard student would be turned upside down discovering life. During a visit to a palliative care center, something mysterious happens. Simone decides to sign up as a volunteer, as if to fill a deep void that follows her everywhere she goes. In her apartment, along along the snow-covered streets of the capital, and even at Boris's home, her lover who'd like to understand the change that's taking place. Without ever sinking into melancholy and maudlin effects, Vital Signs paints a fair, sincere and tender portrait of Simone and those that surround her in their "last mile." Among them is a patient played by none other than Danielle Ouimet, with a rare majesty even on her deathbed. Sophie Deraspe skilfully avoids the temptation to fill out incomfortable moments and punctuates her drama with beautifully humorous winks. Through the lens of the director of Searching for Victor Pellerin, the silent quest of this sudden Mother Teresa Mother Teresa becomes a superb winter poem about life, death and the reasons and the reasons that drive us to help others.