The following is a published article by me (Laura Aguirre) featured on the Daily 49er- the student newspaper at CSULB.
Nathaniel Ayers is a man with a riveting past. At the age of 19, he was one of the first few African-Americans accepted into Juilliard. Ayers played the cello and he had the potential to be one of the greatest musicians. However, during his third year at Juilliard, Ayers lost himself.
Joe Wright’s “The Soloist,” starring Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr., is based on the true life of Nathaniel Ayers. The film does an amazing job in portraying Ayers (Foxx) as a man who has lost his mind in music. Every time the orchestra begins to play, Ayers closes his eyes and his lips turn into a smile. What follows are images of birds flying free over the city, and flamboyant colors in the shapes of circles.The film follows Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez (Downey), who has a deadline, but no story. In his desperate search for a story, he finds himself standing in front of the Walt Disney Concert Hall, heavy-hearted. Suddenly he begins to hear the sound of distant violins. In front of a bronze statue of Beethoven, he meets the subject of his next column, Ayers.
Soon, we discover that Ayers, besides being another homeless man in Los Angeles, is in fact, a man living with schizophrenia. After some research, Lopez discovers Ayers’ difficult past and writes about it. Several successful columns later, Lopez gets a cello from one of his readers as a gift for Ayers.
The highlight of the entire film lies in the moments when Ayers plays the cello for the first time in nearly three decades.
Throughout the film there is a power struggle between Lopez and Ayers, in which both defy each other in small instances.
Foxx does an amazing job as Nathaniel Ayers and will probably receive an Oscar nomination, but “The Soloist” spends more time in the newsroom, than in the slums of Los Angeles. At some point, I doubted who “the soloist” really was. Was it Ayers? Or was it Lopez? Instead of leaving the theater in deep admiration, I left feeling sorry for the 90,000 people living homeless in the streets of Los Angeles, but then again I feel that way about five times a week.
“The Soloist” is a film with great moments and good actors, but in the attempt to tell the tale of a man who loves music more than most people love anything their entire lives, it fails to deliver what I expected. Instead of portraying Lopez as a man with a short temper, he should have been remembered as a hero — or what Ayers’ saw him as — a god. A god that helped him reconnect with the musical soul that dwells inside of him.
3 out of 4 Stars
Summary: The film portrays the life of musical genius Nathaniel Ayers and his journey from the streets of Los Angeles to the Disney Concert Hall.
Our Take: Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr. both give excellent performances of Nathaniel Ayers and Steve Lopez.
source: Daily 49er, photo by dreamworks
