The Soloist Review
By Karen Dahlstrom
On Deaf Ears
Wait, is it Oscar season already? Hollywood usually waits until Fall to trot out its "message" pictures, particularly those that feature a main character with a mental or physical infirmity. Add a "based on a true story" tag and some acting heavyweights and you've got a project primed for Oscar night. Such is the case with "The Soloist", a film that looks, sounds and feels as though it were designed especially to win awards. Despite its formula for success, it's doubtful that anyone will be nibbling at this Oscar bait.
Based on the book by L.A. Times columnist Steve Lopez, "The Soloist" recounts Lopez' real-life relationship with Nathaniel Anthony Ayers, a former music prodigy now living on Skid Row. Tightly wound and nervy, Lopez (Robert Downey, Jr.) is a dyed-in-the-wool newsman, bemoaning the death of print and trading barbs with his editor/ex-wife, Mary (Catherine Keener). He uses any material he can to fill his column, be it local politics, raccoon infestations or events in his own life. It's all fair game. While on the hunt for material for his next column, he runs into Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx), a schizophrenic homeless man picking tunes on a violin missing two strings. They strike up a conversation, consisting of a stream of nonsensical ravings from Ayers and polite, vaguely amused interjections from Lopez. It's only when Ayers mentions he went to Julliard that the journalist begins to pay attention. His interest piqued, a column is born.
His column sparks sympathy (and an increase in sales) with the reading public. Many send in their old instruments as gifts, including a beautiful old cello. In a busy traffic tunnel (a spot favored by the musician for the "fresh air" and fine acoustics), Ayers plays the cello for a captivated Lopez. As Beethoven rings out against the concrete pilings of the road deck, we get a sense of Ayers talent — and of Lopez' desire to mine this story for all it's worth. He makes a deal with Ayers that he can play the cello, but only at a Skid Row community center. It is there that Lopez comes face-to-face with the reality of L.A.'s homeless population. Skid Row, it is clear, is a very scary place. Certainly no place for a musical genius.
As the relationship between Lopez and Ayers grows, it becomes more complicated. Ayers becomes increasingly dependent on his new friend, while Lopez grows uncomfortable with the responsibility he feels toward his subject. Screenwriter Susannah Grant ("
Erin Brockovich") makes a point of not drowning their friendship in sentimentality. By befriending Ayers, Lopez does not wave a magic wand and make his problems disappear. In fact, their friendship brings new challenges for Ayers to overcome.
In the lead roles, Foxx and Downey, Jr. have clearly done their homework. Their characters are fully detailed and nuanced to the nth degree, but to the point of strangulation. They don't allow their characters to breathe, to exist as real people. They fight and strain like frisbee dogs for every dramatic moment, as if trying to out act one another. Also weighing them down is the heavy-handed direction from Joe Wright ("
Atonement"). As the story shifts to focus on Ayers' state of mind, Wright attempts to give the audience a sense of what it's like to be inside Ayers' head. The results are almost laughable. The voices in his head might as well have been lifted from a "LOST" audio track, while a lengthy sequence in which Ayers sees sounds as colors comes off like a night of Laser Beethoven at the local planetarium — just a bunch of colored lights, pulsing in time to the music.
Though the relationship between the two men is the main focus of the film, it also seeks to shed light on the plight of the homeless. L.A.'s indigent population is extensive, with more than 70,000 people living on the street. Ayers' situation is meant to personalize the problem, with the audience looking through Lopez's eyes. But since the filmmakers take such great pains to present a matter-of-fact, unsentimental look at the problem, it's difficult to understand how they want us to feel. Indeed, there's little here to move us. "The Soloist" is like an symphony played by robots. It sounds right, but lacks the soul to challenge and inspire us.
