9) Still Alice (TBD December)
Julianne Moore has received four Academy Award nominations during her career, for turns as varied as a porn star in Boogie Nights and a miserable housewife in The Hours. Fresh off a win at Cannes for her fierce performance in David Cronenberg’s upcoming Maps to the Stars, she may be courting Oscar gold come next February – but for her performance in a completely different film.
Based off a bestselling novel by Lisa Genova, Still Alice tells the story of Alice Howland, a respected Harvard professor with early-onset Alzheimer’s. Genova’s novel tells the story from Alice’s perspective, as she loses her memory and her connection to her husband and three children. Besides Moore’s rave reviews, Alec Baldwin is receiving some of the finest notices of his career for his performance as Alice’s husband, John. Kristen Stewart, Kate Bosworth and Hunter Parrish round out the principal cast.
Still Alice will see a limited one-week run in December to qualify for early 2015’s awards season before widening into release in January. While much of the buzz around the Best Actress race seemed to fall around Reese Witherspoon (for Wild) and Felicity Jones (for The Theory of Everything), a rousing reception at TIFF has put the odds in Moore’s favor. With such a remarkable career without an Oscar win, if the film connects with audiences with the same vigor that Genova’s novel connected with readers, expect her name to be called at various awards ceremonies.