The Soloist

We saw the Soloist this afternoon. We've had friends who thought it was a wonderful movie and others who thought it was not much. For those who have not read the book (I did not) or heard about the movie it is a story about an LA Times reporter and his relationship with a schizophrenic street musician in LA. It does not paint the realities up like a movie in the 1930s might but it also takes some cinematic license with the story, which I think detracted from the power of the story.

Ken Turan, of the LA Times commented "by consistently and relentlessly overplaying everything, by settling for standard easy emotions when singular and heartfelt was called for, by pushing forward when they should have pulled back, director Joe Wright and screenwriter Susannah Grant have made the story mean less, not more." I had the strong feeling in the middle of the movie I was watching "Batman on Mental Illness." He may have been to close to the story. He argues that details were altered for no apparent purpose. "Over and over again, small details are added or subtracted from the story, tiny things, really, like who donated a cello for Ayers to play (the movie says a kindly arthritic lady, the book a corporate chief executive) and whether Ayers and Lopez dramatically pushed Ayers' cart all the way to Disney Hall on a crucial day or realistically stashed it in a convenient garage. None of these things make a difference individually, but in sum they point to a weakness for the obvious and the simplistic that undermine any attempt to do justice to the complexities of the real story."

The odd thing about this movie for me was that I really liked the portrayals of both lead characters. Jamie Foxx is superb and so is Robert Downey, Jr. Even with that I did not get caught up with the characters. It was almost as if I was watching the movie from 30,000 feet. Variety's critic said "Brit director Joe Wright's first American feature has moments of power and imagination, but the overworked style and heavy socially conscious bent exude an off-putting sense of self-importance, making for a picture that's more of a chore than a pleasure to sit through." That is about where I came out.

At the end - for no apparent reason except to show some kind of social conscience - in one of the side comments taking the movie out the fact comes up that there are 90,000 homeless in the "Greater LA Area" - on its face that sounds like a very large number. But it is always good to look at the denominator on the figure - which based on 2006 population is in the range of 17.5 million (which is a bit less more than one half of one percent - assuming the 90,000 number is accurate - which is questionable).

One last comment. The use of music in the movie was wonderful and compelling. I thought the light show in the middle - when the two leads go to a concert - was a bit much - but the classical music comes in and out at just the right times. Whoever, did the score for this, has an appreciation for classical music.