Grade: B
In Still Alice, Julianne Moore earns her 5th Academy Award nomination as a college linguistics professor who finds herself with a diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s Disease. Her character is only 50. The film is serviceable, if not exceptional, as it is largely your typical movie about a person with an affliction, who we watch deteriorate in a couple of hours. Carrying the film is a trio of effective performances from the always-reliable Moore, Alec Baldwin as her loving and patient husband, and believe it or not, Kristen Stewart as one of Moore’s daughters. The perpetually annoyed and worn down demeanor Stewart always seems to have hits the perfect notes here. This subject matter hits fairly close to home for me, as in 2013, I lost two family members (an aunt and an uncle-in-law) within 4 months. Neither had Alzheimer’s, but struggled with similar symptoms involving memory loss and increasing inability to communicate. It’s always difficult to see the “them” of them slowly disappear. The ending of Still Alice isn’t as definitive and complete as you might expect. Nobody dies, and the story is still progressing. Grade: B
Film Reviews by Mark 
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