Still Alice

20th March 2015 20:40 Bolton

With quite a full audience and tissues at the ready, Clare and I were under prepared for an Oscar winning performance, and it turns out Kirsten Stewart can do some acting as well!

Learning that she has an early form of familial Alzheimer disease, Alice,  a linguistic professor slowly deteriorates whilst trying to hold on to the things that make her life worth living.  With three grown children and happily married for years, the relationships are tested as the degenerative disease becomes more and more relentless.

Julianne Moore plays the role of Alice perfectly.  I luckily have not experienced this disease within the family and hope I never get to.  Watching her slowly lose significant pieces of her life, personality and meaning was just heartbreaking.  The strong bond with her daughters and son kept her going and the relationship with Alec Baldwin, her husband, was played perfectly.  Wanting to offer support, but watching his wife slowly lose everything that is important to her.

A couple of scenes really stand out, whilst Alice is presenting a speech to the Alzheimer's group broke my heart, the moisture in the cinema really went up at this point, not a dry eye in the place, and backstage at her daughters performance onstage just ripped at the heart strings again.

I can fully agree with Julianne Moore's Oscar award for best actress from her portray as Alice, but think the Kirsten Stewart deserves a little nod as well.  When she first came on screen as the delinquent daughter, I was ready for wooden acting, but I think working with talent such as JM, something must have rubbed off.

Great film, but don't go to watch if you are feeling extra emotional