Bodily Harm

The closest we've come to a music doc at the same level as Martin Scorcese's The Last Waltz, James Keach's affectionate, reverent, warts-and-all film Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me (PCH Films), tells us as much about the artist as it does about his struggle with Alzheimer's Disease. Opening with Campbell, now in his late 70s, and fourth wife Kim (to whom he has been married since 1982) watching home movies, we witness the effect of Alzheimer's on him as he is unable to recognize himself or others onscreen.

Hot and handsome, "good old country boy" Campbell was a gifted musician who played with the Beach Boys for a few months, was 1968's "Entertainer of the Year," had a successful TV variety show, was an actor (alongside John Wayne in True Grit), and came to be known as the Rhinestone Cowboy (after his song of the same name). A 2011 Alzheimer's diagnosis changed everything for Campbell, who embarked on his final concert tour of more than 150 dates in 2012. What is especially remarkable about these concerts is the way in which Campbell "becomes himself again" when he performs. He may be raging, unreasonable and unable to express himself in his personal, day-to-day life, but once he is onstage, he is in control (or at least as much control as the illness will allow).

Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me strikes a delicate balance between celebrating Campbell's breathtaking talent as a performer, his role as a father, husband (as well as ex-husband), brother and friend, and his life as a patient undergoing treatment for the debilitating illness. Campbell's praises are sung through a series of interviews with people such as his children Ashley, Shannon and Cal, publicist Bobbie Gale, Jimmy Webb (who wrote some of Campbell's biggest hits), Vince Gill, Brad Paisley, Sheryl Crow, The Edge, Kathy Mattea, Bruce Springsteen, Keith Urban, Steve Martin (who was a writer on Campbell's TV show) and President Bill Clinton, among many others. However, it's when Campbell himself does the singing that you realize the value of the legacy he has created and what a loss it is for everyone that his voice has been silenced too soon.

Stephen Hawking biopic The Theory of Everything (Focus) begins in England in 1963 at the time that Hawking (Eddie Redmayne, who played gay in Tom Kalin's "Savage Grace") met his future wife Jane (Felicity Jones) at a party. Scientist/socialist Stephen and arts major/Church of England member Jane make an unlikely pair, but they become a couple and marry regardless of the odds. Those odds, by the way, are substantial considering that Stephen has been diagnosed with a fatal motor-neuron disorder, better known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, and is given only two years to live.

Despite the potential catastrophes that lay ahead, the couple marries and starts a family. Stephen continues his studies at Cambridge, where he has embarked on a PhD in physics, choosing time as his field of study. As he triumphs in his area of study, developing theories that will have long-lasting impacts on science and society, his body begins to rapidly fail him. Outliving his two year death sentence, Stephen's illness also has a devastating effect on Jane. When Jane's mother (Emily Watson) suggests she join the church choir as an outlet, it leads to an unexpected relationship with recently widowed choir director Jonathan (Charlie Cox) that will forever change their lives. Of course, Stephen himself began a relationship with caregiver Elaine (Maxine Peake), which resulted in marriage, following his divorce from Jane.

Redmayne's performance is exceptional, along the lines of Daniel Day Lewis in My Left Foot, and will surely guarantee an Oscar nomination. Jones is also admirable as Jane. If there is a weak link, it's director James Marsh, because, aside from the outstanding lead performances, The Theory of Everything is surprisingly forgettable, which is a sad fact considering its subject.