She received renewed recognition for her performance as an aging celebrity in the body horror film The Substance (2024), winning a Golden Globe and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress.

Her biological father, Air Force airman Charles Foster Harmon Sr.,[24] deserted her then-18-year-old mother, Virginia (née King),[25] after a two-month marriage before Moore's birth.

When Moore was three months old, her mother married Dan Guynes, a newspaper advertising salesman who frequently changed jobs; as a result, the family moved many times.

[2] Virginia Guynes posed nude for the magazine High Society in 1993,[36] where she spoofed Moore's Vanity Fair pregnancy and bodypaint covers and parodied her clay scene from Ghost.

[38] Bob Gardner, a photographer for the Monongahela Daily Herald when Dan Guynes was head of advertising, recalled that Moore "looked malnourished and not so much abused as neglected.

"[26] At age 14, Moore returned to her hometown of Roswell and lived with her grandmother for six months before relocating to Washington state, where her recently separated mother was residing near Seattle.

[60] Moore had already joined the cast of the ABC soap opera General Hospital several months before the film's release, playing the role of investigative reporter Jackie Templeton through 1983.

Her commercial breakthrough came with her role as an uninhibited banker in Joel Schumacher's yuppie drama St. Elmo's Fire (1985), which received negative reviews, but was a box office success and brought her widespread recognition.

[68] In 1988, Moore starred as a prophecy-bearing mother in the apocalyptic drama The Seventh Sign—her first outing as a solo film star—[66] and in 1989, she played the quick-witted local laundress and part time prostitute in Neil Jordan's Depression-era allegory We're No Angels, opposite Robert De Niro.

The love scene between Moore and Patrick Swayze that starts in front of a potter's wheel to the sound of "Unchained Melody" has become an iconic moment in cinema history.

"[76] She maintained her A-list status with her leading roles as a lieutenant commander in Rob Reiner's A Few Good Men (1992), a morally tested wife in Adrian Lyne's Indecent Proposal (1993), and a sexually charged employer in Barry Levinson's Disclosure (1994).

She played an author with commitment issues in the coming-of-age drama Now and Then (1995), a film that found box office success and cult following despite a negative critical reception.

Her portrayal of Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter (1995), a "freely adapted" version of the historical romance novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne, was met with harsh criticism.

[84] In 1996, she provided the voice of Esmeralda in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Dallas Grimes in Beavis and Butt-Head Do America, both of which were the highest-grossing animated films that year.

"[88] Moore returned to the screen playing a villain in the 2003 film Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle,[94] opposite Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu.

[97] In Emilio Estevez's drama Bobby (2006), Moore portrayed an alcoholic singer whose career is on the downswing, as part of an ensemble cast, about the hours leading up to the Robert F. Kennedy assassination.

"[103][104] In 2010, Moore played a daughter helping her father deal with age-related health problems in the dramedy Happy Tears, as well as the matriarch of a family moving into a suburban neighborhood in the comedy The Joneses.

[107] Moore portrayed a chief risk management officer at a large Wall Street investment bank during the initial stages of the financial crisis of 2007–08[108][109] in the critically acclaimed corporate drama Margin Call (2011), where she was part of an ensemble cast that included Kevin Spacey, Simon Baker, and Paul Bettany.

[112][113] Moore played a "brash and overtly sexual second wife" in the black comedy Another Happy Day (2011),[114] mothers in the coming-of-age films LOL (2012)[115] and Very Good Girls (2013),[116] an old flame of a quick-draw killer in the Western drama Forsaken (2015), the daughter of a retired high school teacher in the road comedy Wild Oats (2016),[117] and the neglected wife of an indicted businessman in the drama Blind (2017).

[127][128][129] In 2020, Moore starred as the protective matriarch of a family in the thriller Songbird,[130] played the title role in the podcast Dirty Diana,[131][132][133][134] and was among the celebrities who made cameo appearances modeling lingerie at Rihanna's Savage x Fenty Vol.

[138][139] In Coralie Fargeat's body horror film The Substance (2024), Moore played an aging star who uses a black market drug to make herself younger.

[167] Moore has graced the cover of numerous international fashion magazines, including France's Elle; UK's Grazia; US' W, Vanity Fair, Interview, Rolling Stone, Glamour and InStyle; Australia's Harper's Bazaar and Turkey's Marie Claire.

She has appeared in television commercials for Keds, Oscar Mayer, Diet Coke, Lux, Jog Mate and Seibu Department Stores, and print ads for Versace and Ann Taylor.

Annie Leibovitz shot the picture while Moore was seven months pregnant with her second child, Scout LaRue Willis, intending to portray "anti-Hollywood, anti-glitz" attitude.

[173] The photograph was subject to numerous parodies, including the Spy Magazine version, which placed Moore's then-husband Bruce Willis's head on the body of a male model with a false belly.

[175] In August 1992, Moore again appeared nude on the cover of Vanity Fair, this time modeling for body painting artist Joanne Gair in Demi's Birthday Suit.

Moore was at one point a follower of Philip Berg's Kabbalah Centre religion, and initiated Kutcher into the faith, having said that she "didn't grow up Jewish, but [...] would say that [she has] been more exposed to the deeper meanings of particular rituals than any of [her] friends that did.

She chose to support the organization GEMS: Girls Educational & Mentoring Services, a nonprofit group which aims to empower young women who have been the victims of commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking.

[209] In the documentary, Moore talked to Nepal's prime minister, Jhalanath Khanal, and young girls who were forced into prostitution before being saved by a Nepalese nonprofit.

[209][210] Moore appeared on PETA's Worst-Dressed List in 2009 for wearing fur;[211] two years later she supported the group's efforts to ban circus workers' use of bullhooks on elephants.