Dave's Progress. Chapter 66: "The Soloist"- A Palinode.

For those of you who are wondering, a palinode is a poem in which a poet retracts what he said in a previous poem. OK, so this isn’t a poem, but it is a blog in which I would like to retract something which I said previously and, I think, unfairly, about the film “The Soloist”, starring Robert Downey Jnr. and Jamie Foxx.
The blog was entitled “Mediocrities of the World, I Absolve You”, and was an attempt to explain, in response to one journalist’s claims, why so-called positive images of mental ill health in the movies are sometimes just as irksome as their negative counterparts. In particular, I focused on the “tortured genius” stereotype, which Foxx’s portrayal of a cello-playing homeless man, possibly experiencing the symptoms of schizophrenia, seemed to embody.
However, having now seen the film in its entirety (I had only previously seen the trailer), I now find that I liked the film immensely and found it really to be a sensitive and respectful portrayal of both homelessness and mental ill health.
I had suggested in my blog that the film implied that Downey Jnr’s character, a well respected journalist, only liked the Foxx character because of his playing, and, furthermore, that he was then only worth saving because of his latent talent, not because of the fact that he was simply a human being who deserved better. However, the film does portray Foxx’s character as a fully rounded human being, albeit one with severe problems. It also looked in to his past and showed just how he had ended up where he was. His playing seemed, at times, secondary to this, and Downey Jnr.’s character did appear to genuinely like the man.
I also suggested in my blog that after years of mental ill health, one’s cognitive abilities could be affected, thereby making things like playing the cello extremely difficult, no matter how talented you had previously been. I used the pianist David Helfgott as an example of this. But again, to be fair to the film, it did portray Foxx’s character’s difficulties in returning to playing and, indeed, any semblance of “normality”. At one point, for example, we see him trying to give a concert at the request of Downey Jnr., but he is unable to give any rendition as he begins to hear voices and so simply runs away. Interestingly, then, Downey Jnr.’s character has to acknowledge the fact that he cannot force Foxx back into “normality”, eventually having to respect his right to live unmedicated and without treatment.
The emotional underpinnings of the film, then, are perhaps more complex than I had previously given it credit for and Foxx’s character is no two-dimensional stereotype.
Having said all this, I do still stand by what I said about the “tortured genius” stereotype in general. For instance, that it does leave the rest of us who cannot play the piano or cello, or paint, or write, or deduce complex mathematical problems with something of an issue. Where do we fit, as the plebeians of the mental health world? Along with the rest of the negative stereotypes?
So, a palinode of sorts. In fact, perhaps I should call it a “palinblog”. And I would still like to say, in response to depictions of mental health which would appear to distinguish between the worthy “tortured genius” and the unworthy average mentally ill person, “mediocrities of the world, I absolve you”.
That’s all for now from your normal, average, delusional and paranoid man.