The Soloist

Egad, what a mess. The Soloist should be a pretty interesting character study. And it no doubt would be, if director Joe Wright could manage to tone down the filmmaking and focus on good old-fashioned storytelling. You probably know Mr. Wright from a couple of well-received literary adaptations: his shimmery, pleasant Pride and Prejudice, and, more recently, his haunting Atonement. So, the man's got talent. But perhaps it's limited to non-threateningly artistic period pieces of l'amour, typified by angsty, smoldering gazes; he's ill-suited to helming a project with two modern-day acting titans, Robert Downey, Jr. and Jamie Foxx. Perhaps the project isn't...feminine enough to work under Wright's direction. Streamlining would have done this movie a world of good.

Anyway, so here's the story: RDJ plays Steve Lopez, a down-on his luck, opportunistic journalist who one day runs into Nathaniel Ayers (Mr. Foxx), a gifted celloist whose schizophrenia has cast him out of Julliard and onto the streets of California. Desperate for a new story, Lopez begins penning the story of how this intelligent landed himself in crushing poverty, unable to discern fact from fiction and gods from men. Theoretically, this makes an interesting movie. If that's all there is to it. These guys are such compelling performers that audiences instantly connect and sympathize with the gentlemen they see on-screen. Both men play their roles with sensitivity and depth, and they can hold their own with each other. However, neither man is examined with any care, and close-ups on Downey's classically handsome countenance are supposed to substitute for character development. The film gets so bogged down in trippy light shows, coyote urine, and unseen family members that we never really learn anything about anyone.

It's hard to say which of these flaws is the most intrusive in the film. Is it the non-linear story-telling, which leaves us feeling as confused as Mr. Ayers? Probably so. The fact of the matter is that this is not an indie film, and imagining this modern-day, true story merely detracts from the power of the human drama. One also gets the distinct feeling that characters in the film hint at several storylines that have been all but eradicated in editing. What's the deal with the throwaway line about the college son? Why is circulation down at the Los Angleles Times? Is anyone we actually meet in the movie going to get fired? What does that say about the informed public and the state of poverty? One cannot help but feel that this film wants to give a social message that it just doesn't have the gravitas to offer; it leaves many questions unanswered that should never have been asked in the first place.

As is one of the arguments of the film itself, it's become to easy for this man's life to become an art project, with no responsibility attached to Lopez, or in this case, Wright. Mr. Ayers's story is no longer the focus. The focus has become creating a piece of art, and for the film, it's a formless, confused process that all too often forgets its heart.