Starring: Julianne Moore, Kristen Stewart, Alec Baldwin, Kate Bosworth.
Still Alice, follows a linguistic college professor and her journey with developing and dealing with early Alzheimer's.
Everything about this film was poetically beautiful. The script was well thought out and the visuals brought out a lot, in terms of emotion.
The plot was definitely unique. The only film I can recall discussing the topic of Alzheimer's is The Notebook, so I found it really interesting to watch this. I thought the film gave a lot of insight into the disease and more importantly how someone who has it must be feeling. It's not really a disorder you can physically see but this film allowed to see just how much it actually does affect people.
Julianne Moore put on a excellent performance. She carried tonnes of emotion in her and was able to show the deterioration her illness had caused her but in a very natural and believable way. It wasn't sad in the way My Sister's Keeper (2009) was sad but it held a very underlying sadness to it. She wasn't too dramatic and was very toned down which made the whole film seem much more real and believable.
Whilst the film was about Alzheimer's initially, I felt it was more about relationships and emotions. The dynamic that was shown between Alice (Julianne Moore) and daughter Lydia (Kristen Stewart) was very warming and relatable to watch. It reminded me of my relationship with my mother and how I would feel if it was my mother that was sick. The relationship with husband John (Alec Baldwin) was also beautiful. It showed us love in a different way. Love by caring and being there but also the tough reality of loving someone who is essentially dying and you being helpless.
Whilst the cinematography wasn't anything spectacular, it had a essence of softness to it which matched the vibe of the story and characters. The shots were very close-up and personal which matched the tone of the film and helped show a lot of emotion from the characters. The colours were fairly muted but delicate which also matched the personality of the characters and those colours against Moore's red hair were simply stunning.
The ending however wasn't what I was expecting. It was left very open-ended but I was hoping for some kind of conclusion. The movie finished but I wanted more. I feel like whilst I gained a lot of insight into the disease, I didn't gain much from the story. That's not to say the ending was bad because it did work but I think the story was cut too short.
Overall, I really enjoyed Still Alice. The story, the acting and the visuals were all wonderful.
