After four nominations, Julianne Moore finally earned an Oscar with 2014’s Still Alice. The movie offers the story of cognitive degeneration.

A linguistics professor at Columbia University, Dr. Alice Howland (Moore) celebrates her fiftieth birthday with her husband John (Alec Baldwin) and adult kids Anna (Kate Bosworth) and Tom (Hunter Parrish). Youngest daughter Lydia (Kristen Stewart) remains in California, where she pursues a career in acting.

We observe as Alice starts to experience mental blips. She loses her train of thought during a lecture, she forgets where she is during a jog around campus, and she can’t recall recipes she’s made for years.

Concerned with her symptoms, Alice goes to a neurologist and she eventually receives a diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s Disease. We follow how she and her family deal with this.

The focus remains on Alice, and that becomes both a strength and a weakness for the film. On the negative side, the supporting characters tend to feel like one-dimensional props, especially Alice’s husband and kids. Except for perhaps Lydia – who gets to grow as the movie goes – these roles lack the exposition necessary to develop them in a satisfying manner.

This seems especially true for John, who almost feels like the movie’s “villain”. We watch as he consistently favors his career over Alice and he ignores her requests to spend more time together.

We get hints that this acts as the way he copes with her illness, but the film doesn’t spell out the theme well enough, so John tends to come across like a selfish jerk.

That said, Alice really should focus on its lead character, and the first person manner in which it depicts the issues related to Alzheimer’s become a strong point. The movie tends to play events in a fairly understated manner, so we don’t get many tears or histrionics.

Instead, we follow Alice’s slow, gradual deterioration, and this semi-objective telling makes matters all the more heartbreaking. Alice avoids TV movie melodrama and gives us a fairly objective take. Sure, it can lean toward slight manipulation at times, but it keeps those choices to a minimum.

Moore certainly boosts the project with her stellar performance. She makes Alice believable and human, without the showy overplaying that someone else might’ve brought to the part. Moore undergoes a true transformation and creates an indelible impression.

I could quibble with other aspects of Alice, but it does too much right for me to pursue those complaints. In the end, it brings us a dramatic, emotional examination of Alzheimer’s and the impact it creates.

Still Alice appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 1.85:1 on this 4K UHD Disc. This was a generally positive Dolby Vision presentation.

At times, sharpness seemed a bit iffy, as some interiors tended to be a little fuzzy. This wasn’t a substantial issue, tough, and the film was usually fairly accurate.

I saw no jagged edges or shimmering, and the movie lacked edge haloes. I also failed to discern any print flaws, as the film remained clean and clear.

Colors veered toward a somewhat amber feel. Other tones tended to seem fairly desaturated, and these came across fine given the palette choices. HDR added some emphasis and range to the hues.

Blacks seemed deep and dark, while shadows were reasonably concise. HDR gave whites and contrast a little extra boost. Nothing here really impressed, but the image worked fine most of the time.

Similar feelings greeted the low-key DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack of Still Alice. The soundscape lacked much ambition, as even street/beach scenes stayed constrained.

A few unique elements popped up in the surrounds – like a guy who handed out leaflets on a college campus – but this was a mostly restricted mix without a ton of environmental information.

Audio quality appeared fine. Music was warm and full, and speech remained natural and concise.

Effects had little to do, but they showed good accuracy and clarity. No one will use this mix to demo home theaters, but it suited the story.

How did the 4K UHD compare to the Blu-ray version? Audio seemed identical.

As for the Dolby Vision 4K, it boasted moderately superior visuals, with a tick up in definition, colors and blacks. Due to the nature of the source, this didn’t become a major upgrade, but the 4K did seem like the preferred rendition.

The set includes three featurettes. Directing Alice goes for eight minutes, 40 seconds and includes comments from writers/directors Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland and actor Julianne Moore.

Glatzer dealt with ALS during the film’s production and died from related complications in March 2015 – so “Directing” shows how he and Westmoreland worked on Alice. This becomes an abnormally interesting – and moving - look behind the scenes.

With the nine-minute, 20-second, Finding Alice, we get info from Moore, Glatzer, Washington, Alzheimer’s Association Chief Science Officer Maria Carillo, executive producer Maria Shriver, early-stage Alzheimer’s advisor Sandy Oltz, co-producer Elizabeth Gelfand-Stearns, and actors Alec Baldwin and Kristen Stewart.

“Finding” examines the actors’ research and their approach to the roles. The featurette delivers another insightful view of the subject matter.

An Interview with Composer Ilan Eshkeri lasts six minutes, 29 seconds. In this piece, we learn about the movie’s music. Though not as good as the prior two programs, this one adds some good details.

Three Deleted Scenes run a total of six minutes, eight seconds. We find “Original Intro” (1:58), “Doctor Visit” (2:10) and “Student Presentation” (2:12). Though I wouldn’t deem any of them to provide crucial information, all three bring us some good moments.

Though not a great film, Still Alice provides a fairly involving, emotional look at the course Alzheimer’s Disease takes. Led by an excellent performance from Julianne Moore, it mostly succeeds. The 4K UHD offers generally good picture and audio as well as a small but useful set of supplements. Alice becomes a moving drama.

Note that as of November 2022, this 4K UHD disc of Still Alice appears solely via an 11-film “Sony Picture Classics 30th Anniversary” box. It also includes Orlando, Celluloid Closet, City of Lost Children, Run Lola Run, SLC Punk, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Devil’s Backbone, Volver, Synecdoche, New York, and Call Me By Your Name.

To rate this film visit the original review of STILL ALICE