Movie Review: ‘The Soloist’ plucks at Oscar’s heartstrings
Jamie Foxx plays Nathaniel Ayers, a real-life musical prodigy whose mental instability led to homelessness, in “The Soloist.” FRANCOIS DUHAMEL DreamWorks/ Universal Pictures
3 stars
Combining mental illness, homelessness, journalism, cello music and a directing style that veers toward the epic, “The Soloist” encounters some trouble in maintaining a tone.
Yet this fact-based story of a newspaper columnist (Robert Downey Jr.) who befriends a homeless, schizophrenic musician (Jamie Foxx) also testifies to the power of grouping big talents in a project. Downey, Foxx and director Joe Wright (”Atonement”) ultimately pierce the more artificial elements to deliver an unusually perceptive film.
As Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez, Downey imparts the single-minded humanity of the crusading journalist as well as the doubts that creep in once Lopez recognizes that the story of former Juilliard prodigy Nathaniel Ayers will not be contained in a neat 22 column inches. Downey, who comes across as disarming yet determined in nearly every role, and who played San Francisco Chronicle (and Sacramento Bee) newsman Paul Avery in “Zodiac,” comes pre-wired for the role of journalistic coaxer. Foxx has the much more difficult task, since his character is nearly impossible to play without seeming like too much.
That Ayers is a real person doesn’t factor in to how the performance plays on screen. Seeing a man dressed as Uncle Sam and talking in a jumble on Los Angeles’ Skid Row or in San Francisco’s Tenderloin wouldn’t merit a second glance from anyone familiar with those places. But seeing an Oscar-winning actor doing the same thing on screen can be disconcerting.
One’s first thought, upon seeing Foxx in “The Soloist,” is “Oscar bait.” It sounds cynical, yes, but his character’s musical brilliance and monotone word streaming initially seem too “Rain Man” for comfort.
But Foxx is too good an actor to rely on mannerisms or props, and he finds a way into the character, establishing Ayers as a smart, friendly guy who just happens to be a lot more unusual than most smart, friendly guys. By the film’s end, Foxx has connected fully to the audience, revealing a soul who yearns to respond to kindness as powerfully as he responds to Beethoven.
Foxx accomplishes this despite director Wright’s tendency to reach for the poetic in filming scenes of Ayers and other homeless people on Skid Row. The dramatic score and Wright’s “Oh, the humanity!” sweeping camerawork – an approach that seems more artistic than compassionate – can distance audience from story.
But Wright eventually steeps “The Soloist” in empathy and realism, starting with the film’s depiction of today’s newspaper industry. By juxtaposing a shot of Lopez literally chasing a story with a conversation in the Times newsroom about employees taking early retirement, “The Soloist” shows that true journalistic zeal transcends any industry shifts.
Though his verve is intact, Lopez’s frustration level grows daily once he becomes more personally involved with Ayers. In trying to secure a home for a cello donated by a reader and for the man who plays it so beautifully, Lopez finds the biggest hurdle in the process to be the musician himself.
Successful as a portrait of an unlikely friendship and as a look at the modern world of newspapering, “The Soloist” truly distinguishes itself in its thoughtful depiction of homelessness as a problem impervious to quick fixes. To the passer-by who sees a homeless person and wonders why he or she cannot just get it together, “The Soloist” offers this answer: It’s very, very complicated.
Source: www.sacbee.com
Movie Review: What the devil has got into Tom Hanks?
Tom Hanks and Ayelet Zurer star in “Angels & Demons,” filmed as a sequel to “The Da Vinci Code.”
2 stars
“Angels & Demons” might cause controversy among viewers who like their Tom Hanks films to be of some substance.
A Hanks collaboration with director Ron Howard suggests a certain prestige. But “Angels & Demons” is just a B-grade adventure film dressed up with big names and a Vatican setting. Remove the red robes and ominous music, and you’re left with occasionally gripping but mostly adequate action scenes and a lead character who’s only moderately likable.
When did Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon (Hanks) become so smug? In “The Da Vinci Code,” Langdon seemed awed by his opportunity to explore the roots of Christianity. But at the start of “Angels & Demons,” presented as a sequel even though “Code” author Dan Brown wrote “Angels” first, Langdon is brusque and self-important. Though his attitude shifts to one of single-minded determination when he becomes a cog in the film’s race-the-clock plot, that initial impression of Langdon is hard to shake.
Langdon goes to Rome just after a pope’s death to help crack the code of the Illuminati, the ancient science-loving society once violently suppressed (at least according to the movie) by the Catholic Church. Apparently miffed at the Kennedy assassination for hogging the attention of the world’s conspiracy nuts, a seemingly reinvigorated Illuminati kills a scientist who has just made a significant (and highly combustible) breakthrough, then threatens to kill four cardinals chosen as possible papal successors at the rate of one cardinal per hour.
In order to move freely within the Vatican while conducting his research, Langdon must win the approval of the camerlengo (Ewan McGregor), secretary to the late pope and acting head of state for Vatican City. Angelic-looking even when playing dirt bags, McGregor positively glows here as a priest who appears immune to power plays within Vatican walls.
Though it would be a stretch to call “Angels & Demons” a flattering portrait of church leadership, the film does balance out any negativity with moments of top-ranking church officials sincerely expressing their profound faith. But the primary message sent by “Angels & Demons” is one most of us already received: The Vatican plays its cards close to the robes.
“Angels” doesn’t shed much new light, period. Much of the action occurs at Rome landmarks (some shot on location, some re-created in Hollywood) where illumination levels run the range from lamplit to shadowy. Watching “Angels & Demons” is like visiting Rome and wearing one’s Wayfarers even indoors.
Howard stages a few truly stunning scenes, one of which is sure to knock viewers out of the daze created by endless action sequences, constant puzzle- solving and performances by Armin Mueller-Stahl, as an ambitious cardinal, and Stellan Skargard, as head of the Swiss Guard Vatican security force, that border on caricature.
Yet these characters are complex compared with Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer), a colleague of the murdered scientist and a partner in the investigation with Langdon. Israeli actress Zurer seems smart and capable, but her character gets little to do. Howard probably had his reasons for hiring an Israeli actress to play a supporting character who easily could have been played by a native Italian speaker. But “Angels” never reveals the answer to that particular puzzle.
Source: www.sacbee.com
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