Julianne Moore (an Oscar®-winner for her astonishingly sad, brilliant performance) is Alice, a successful Columbia University linguistics professor who struggles to maintain her mind and self after being diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's (she is only 50) in this profoundly moving but never exploitative adaptation of Lisa Genova's 2007 novel.

Alice juggles being a wife to John (Alec Baldwin) and mother to three children (Hunter Parrish, Kate Bosworth and Kristen Stewart) with her busy, successful career. She has it all until she begins to forget words - which are her livelihood - the names of her children, and the way home. We watch as the disease makes swift progress while her family try to cope with the situation, their true colours soon coming out, and her rebel daughter (Stewart) becoming her willing caretaker.

Married directors Glatzer and Westmoreland have an especially personal input into the film (Glatzer suffers from Motor Neuron Disease (ALS) and had to direct using a text-to-speech app) and they deal with the effects of this cruel, absurd disease with compassion and grace. Alice's situation is devastating, but never, ever hopeless. A gorgeous, piercing and sensitive look at mastering, in the words of poet Elizabeth Bishop, the art of losing.

Hear audience reactions to the film - from the Alzheimer's Society, Kerry McCarthy MP and those living with the disease - in these moving vox pops we recorded last week.

• The evening screenings of Still Alice on Tue 17 March are part of our Cinébites deal: get a cinema ticket, veggie or meat chilli, and a drink (wine/beer or soft drink) for only £15.

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