Movie Review: The Soloist

Directed by Joe Wright, starring Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr.

Apr 27, 2009

"The Soloist," which hit theaters Friday, is based on a book by reporter Steve Lopez, who has a life-changing relationship with a resident of Skid Row.

What began as a bottom of the list story idea, morphed into a series of widely read columns, a bestselling book, and now a movie about one reporter’s encounter with a homeless street musician.

Steve Lopez (Robert Downey Jr.) is an uninspired L.A. Times columnist with a passionless career and family life. A defeated afternoon walk through Skid Row in Los Angeles leads him to an encounter with homeless street musician, Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx), who’s playing an impressive minuet on a two-stringed violin. Throughout the course of their conversation, Ayers tells Lopez and-- other figments of his imagination-- about his past enrollment at the prestigious Juiliard School and incessant love of Beethoven.

Suspecting a mildly interesting column topic, Lopez researches the street musician’s background, and finds that he was in fact a star cello student at Juilliard and a musical genius before a schizophrenic breakdown left him sleeping on one of the most dangerous streets of Skid Row.

The more the two men meet (often on the shoulder of the freeway), the more Lopez features Ayres in his weekly columns. One inspired, arthritis-ridden reader even donates an old cello for Lopez to give to Ayers.

The street musician is moved to tears as he plays the cello for the first time since Juilliard. Lopez watches, enthralled as the cello’s deep moans reverberate off the urban concert hall: a concrete freeway overpass. It isn’t until a late-night tipsy conversation with his ex-wife that Lopez realizes he has never loved anything as much as Ayers loves music.

The continuing relationship inspires Lopez to get Ayers cello lessons, a public recital, a one-room apartment, and an eventual reuniting with his sister--actions that often leave him feeling more hopeless than helpful. Column after column delves Lopez further into the life of a homeless, mentally ill musical genius who lives like so many others on Skid Row--a place where ugliness and beauty seemingly coexist.

The film is based on Steve Lopez’s book, The Soloist: A Lost Dream, an Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music (Putnam, 2008).

After their first encounter in early 2005, Lopez went on to write a series of columns and eventually a book about his interactions with Ayers. In his October 2005 column, “From Skid Row to Disney Hall,” Lopez recounts about Ayers playing a cello at a Los Angeles Philharmonic rehearsal the two attended at Disney Hall:

“And then he played, without the bow at first, picking the strings with his right hand. It was Bach's Cello Suite No. 1: Prelude. Several Philharmonic staffers heard the music and wandered over, peering in to see a man of the streets, tattered and elegant, close his eyes and drift into ecstasy.”

Based on the trailers for the movie, The Soloist, viewers could expect a Hollywood “things aren’t always what they seem” message about friendship and acceptance. There were moments when the film could have made some bold statement about advocating for the homeless or mentally ill. But it doesn’t. Instead, the beauty is found in the film’s simple yet profound story about a man who, when discovered by a homeless musician, discovers himself.

The Soloist, a DreamWorks and Universal Pictures release, is rated PG-13 for thematic elements, some drug use and language. 116 minutes. Directed by Joe Wright.

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