Word: soloists
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...down on his luck and I thought I could help him.” But this motive bears little in the way of transformation or even explanation. The 1996 movie “Shine,” whose plot is almost identical to that of “The Soloist,” traced the struggles and recovery of pianist David Helfgott to a provocative and satisfying resolution. Unlike that movie, however, “The Soloist” never answers the question it first posited: can music and human care provide the courage to reclaim what?...
Director Joe Wright's The Soloist is a deeply empathetic exploration of mental illness and a winning showcase for the talents of its two stars, Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx. Its third great component is its relationship to daily newspapers - it's either the ultimate advertising campaign for a dying industry or the perfect funeral wreath...
...Soloist makes a compelling case for two things in increasingly short supply in the newspaper world today: veterans like Lopez, who are awarded the gift of time to find his stories, and readers who respond to them. Just after Lopez writes a column explaining that the cello is Ayers's true love, but he doesn't have one, Wright cuts to a little old lady reading the paper with her arthritic hands, a cello in the background. The next morning, we get a driver's seat view of that cello, winding its way through the newsroom in a mail cart...
...what elevates The Soloist into the ranks of the best newspaper movies is its honesty. The columnist wants that column, and maybe a follow up, and yes, making a sorry life less sad is good, but he never wanted to become a defacto one-man Social Services Agency. He can't cure Ayers and no one is trying to gloss over that reality here (except for one scene at the end that contradicts what we've come to know about Ayers' ability to cope with crowds). All Lopez can do is try to help, and the movie gives testimony...
...Like this month's other newspaper movie, State of Play, The Soloist has been updated from a few years past to what feels like this morning. An editor looks out a window, despondent, dulled with pain, as off-camera, another one of her employees is advised to take a buyout. As Lopez reports from his desk, a freshly laid-off journalist trails a security guard out of the building. Yet The Soloist still makes you want to run out and be a newspaper columnist. Crazy? Maybe a little. Certainly most industry observers would gently suggest you choose a more obtainable...