Spoiler alert.

Before Monday, April 27 we hadn’t seen a movie in a movie theater for over 18 months.  The last one we saw was Into the Wild in October 2007.  It’s actually difficult to catch a movie we want to see because so many films come and go through theaters.  We usually don’t want to pay the $8-$10 tickets and when we get passes, they’re usually only good for two weeks after the release.  Still, we wanted to see The Soloist because most of the events on which it is based took place in Downtown L.A. when we lived there 3-5 years ago.  It’s about our old home.

We had often driven past the sign for the Foothill Cinema theaters just up the street north of us.  It seemed like an old independent theater that charged less than most.  During the past couple of years it has been renovated and is now the Regency Foothill Cinema 10, though I’ve also seen it listed as Golin Theaters under moviefone.com.  They’ve added stadium seating to at least some of the theaters and increased admission but it’s still only $7 for regular showings and $5 for matinees, a real bargain for the first run movies it shows.  The sign is no longer displayed along the road and the building is located discreetly behind the shops at the redone Citrus Crossing shopping block.  But it’s easy enough to find.  We did recon a few days before to figure out how to get to and from the theater and whether what we read about it online was true.  Other than the name, “Golin,” everything was.  They do charge the low admission and have further discounts for seniors and children, though no student discount that we could see.  They don’t have as many showings or theaters as some of the larger multiplexes such as the AMC Theaters Covina 30, but they have enough.  There doesn’t seem like much parking as most of it is along the curb in front of the theater, though I think there’s more in the back.

We went to the 12:45 pm Monday showing of The Soloist because we figured they would more likely charge matinee price and it wouldn’t be very crowded.  I had heard the theaters had stadium seating but I wasn’t sure if all of them had it.  If it didn’t at least it wouldn’t be crowded and we could still see.  We arrived and parked in one of the angled spots along the curb in front.  They have windows outside to buy tickets, but since there were so few people the guy at the window told us to go inside and buy our tickets at the concession counter.  The inside looks like a regular theater lobby, though a bit smaller, with a room with arcade games.  The restrooms are upstairs, though they also have ones downstairs for the disabled only.  Next to the cash register they had a box of brochures for Regency Theaters (www.regencymovies.com).  It listed the latest movies showing with a little synopsis of each.  The one for the Soloist was completely wrong.  It said something about a jazz musician/ hitman unwittingly hired to take out himself.  It was very silly and not at all what the movie is really about.  They must have a low-bid contractor doing their brochures or something.  However, my wife liked the seemingly accurate synopsis of the film 17 Again, and now even wants to see that film.

Our tickets for The Soloist indicated that it was in theater number 7 that did have stadium seating.  The theater didn’t have the annoying smell of popcorn and it didn’t fill up much.  The other patrons were mostly elderly, probably taking advantage of not working during the day and the senior discount.  There were a couple of patrons in front who had the annoying habit of occasionally commenting during the movie.  Before the movie started they showed slides of E! True Hollywood trivia on the screen, mostly questions about films coming out in the next month or two and interesting facts about actors and directors.  The film began at 12:48 pm with some car commercials.  They showed the same one for the Nissan Z twice in a row; it begins just like a movie preview.  There were only three trailers, all for films I already heard of: My Sister’s Keeper with Cameron Diaz and Abigail Breslin, The Proposal with Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds, and Imagine That with Eddie Murphy.  They don’t seem like films I want to see.  At least Imagine That is more comprehensible than Murphy’s last film, Meet Dave.

As for the film we came to see, The Soloist, we enjoyed it very much.  It’s based on a true story about L.A. Times columnist Steve Lopez meeting and getting to know homeless musician Nathaniel Anthony Ayers Jr.  Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx play Lopez and Ayers.  Steve writes columns about Nathaniel, columns I read when originally published, and over time slowly but perhaps unwittingly gets much closer to him than he normally gets to his column topics.  He wants to help Nathaniel but finds it much more difficult and complicated than he thought.  Both Steve and Nathaniel go through many changes over the course of the film, though much is left unresolved.  It’s not like most Hollywood movies where the characters go through a major positive transformation with a happy ending but it’s more like the real life on which it is based.  Rather than a turnoff I found the ambiguities refreshing, like the film was trying to present the real story rather than try to manipulate the audience.

There was a lot in the film that we could relate to: current events we’ve read about, places we’ve visited or heard about, and people we’ve seen.  The depiction of the Skid Row area looks just as dirty, crowded, gritty, and scary as the parts of the real Skid Row that we’ve seen.  Many real homeless people from there appear in the film.  One of them, who had a small speaking role, was recently shot and killed in the lobby of the supportive housing complex depicted in the film and where the real Nathaniel Ayers currently lives.  My wife cried when she saw his name in the credits.  The film shows parts of Pershing Square, some of which didn’t look familiar to us, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall with the real musical director Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting.  We’ve seen him in concert and I chatted with him when I got his autograph.  Then and current Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is played by a younger, taller, and better-looking actor, though he initially sounds a bit like the real “Smooth Operator”.  We’ve seen the real mayor several times.  The film portrays current events such as the effects of the Safe Cities Initiative and the newspaper business suffering from fewer people reading them.

Both lead actors do excellent jobs as do the supporting cast including Catherine Keener as Steve’s fictional ex-wife.  The real Steve Lopez is not divorced.  Foxx embodies the complicated and conflicted Nathaniel and Downey Jr. especially captures Steve’s ambition, challenges, frustrations, and also his low-key acceptance, and sense of humor.  Ayers and Lopez have some humorous interactions.  They thoroughly portray the difficulty of getting Nathaniel into housing after being homeless for many years and I could almost sympathize with Nathaniel’s reluctance to make the change.  Scenes with voiceover and seemingly dream sequences capture Nathaniel’s struggles and his love of music.  The classical music is beautiful and sometimes played against complementary scenes such as colored lights and a trip down a familiar part of the L.A. River.

This film has some things in common with other good films we’ve seen in the past several years.  Into the Wild also had a scene with the L.A. River and starred Catherine Keener and Jena Malone.  Collateral was also a movie starring Jamie Foxx with scenes filmed in Downtown L.A., and Shattered Glass also had a character that was a journalist named Steve or Stephen.  As stated, the film doesn’t have much resolution and Steve and Nathaniel’s story goes on.  There was a column in December about them celebrating Beethoven’s birthday.  The film does not seem overly long or like it could have included more.  Despite not resolving the issues presented it is still about friendship and personal triumphs, and it made me feel good despite its reality.  I recommend it to anyone.  I also recommend the theater that’s a find in the San Gabriel Valley.  We’ll be seeing more films there, I’m sure.

Thursday, February 12 was my last day in Nashville for a work conference.  The conference ended sometime between 12:30 - 1:00 pm.  They elected to finish early rather than break for lunch and return in the afternoon.  The day before I had overheard some conference participants who were local mention that they went to the Schermerhorn for lunch and had quick pre-made meals.  I asked them about it and they said it was the Schermerhorn Symphony Center that was right across the street from the hotel.  Now I knew what they meant because I had walked by the building with signs for the Nashville symphony.  It was a nice building of light gray stone less than a block north of the hotel.  There were Greek-style columns on the north end and a golden statue of an angel near the southwest end.  Across the street to the south were these black boxes on the sidewalk that played classical music constantly.  Similar boxes in other parts of the city played country music and rock music.

After the conference ended most of the other participants left the hotel, some to catch their flights, others to do some last minute souvenir shopping.  I still had several hours before my flight so I walked over to the Schermerhorn building.  I wasn’t sure where to enter and I walked all the way to the north end with the columns.  It seemed like a main entrance.  I entered what seemed like a main lobby of the concert hall.  Through another door on the right I passed what looked like a group taking a tour.  I went through another door towards the southeast end of the building and found the café.  It’s really just a counter where they sell pre-made sandwiches and salads.  It’s similar to the Patina shop at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, only this is just a counter with some tables for customers to sit and eat their food.  In addition to the sandwiches and salads they also had a hot meal behind the counter.  I asked the man behind the counter what it was and he said, “Chicken in red wine sauce with asparagus.”  I asked if it had dairy and he took the time to call the chef on the phone to find out.  It was well past 1 pm and there was no one else there getting lunch.  It looked he had one serving of chicken and asparagus left.  He told me that it did not contain any diary so I ordered it and he put it in a plastic take-out container.

They had put away most of the napkins and utensils because the café was about to close.  I returned to the hotel lobby / dining area where my coworker and her husband were having take-out from Fiesta Mexicana.  My meal was pretty good with the chicken fully cooked but not dry, the sauce flavorful and just enough for the chicken.  The asparagus was also good.  It was an adequate amount of food but it may have too little if I had been very hungry; my stomach was still getting used to the two hour time change.  Soon after finishing lunch I caught the Gray Line shuttle to Nashville Airport.

For my third dinner in Nashville I wanted to try something different from barbecue so I walked east from the hotel to 2nd Street and then north towards where it intersected with Broadway.  I had to cross 2nd Street a couple of times because the sidewalks were closed in parts.  I didn’t see anyone else walking the streets.  It was a bit cold and windy.  I had originally heard about Joe’s Crab Shack when looking up restaurants near the hotel using Mapquest.com.  I had already tried one seemingly out-of-place restaurant that day, Fiesta Mexicana, and it was pretty good so I thought I’d try a seafood place.  I guess it wasn’t entirely out of place since Nashville has the Cumberland River and Joe’s was fairly close to it.  The place was hard to miss.  On the south end of the building housing the restaurant lighted orange letters said, “Eat at Joe’s” and below them was a painting of an old sailor (Joe?).  It had another lit-up sign on the north corner of the building that said, “Joe’s Crab Shack.”

I entered the restaurant and it was very large with high ceilings, much larger than a mere shack.  It looked like it had tables on the upper floor.  There was a large bar area.  They seated me in a large open area that I’m guessing could double as a dance floor.  There was a stage along the back wall but it wasn’t in use this Wednesday evening.  A sign said they had live music on Friday and Saturday.  Hanging from the ceiling were seashell mobiles that looked like chandeliers.  Above me was hanging a model of a great white shark, though it looked more cartoonish than scary.  Above the stage on the wall were clocks that supposedly gave the time in different places.  They had clocks for Houston, Prince Edward Island, Disco Island (?), London, Green Bay, “Bay of Pigs”, and Nashville.  They didn’t look like they had the right times.  In fact, many looked like they had stopped.

The server came by and gave us a large menu.  It had many items in multiple sections.  There were all kinds of seafood: crab, shrimp, cod, tilapia, “surf & turf”, sandwiches, appetizers, burgers.  I asked the server about the crab-stuffed shrimp, inquiring whether it had dairy.  After checking she said everything on the menu had dairy except the hamburgers and fries.  Soon after, an older server, possibly a manager or chef, asked if he could help.  I ask if he could cook some tilapia in oil and he said, “Sure.”  He offered to spice it up with Cajun spices and serve it with fries.

My first course was a simple lettuce and crouton salad with a strawberry vinaigrette from which I easily picked out the croutons.  Not long afterward they brought out my fish on a large colorful plate with pictures of crabs around the outside.  The fish had red spices sprinkled on it and it was very good, cooked just right, though not heavy like fried fish.  The fries or “chips” were also good, fried until they were golden and crisp.  I ate slowly, enjoying the meal.  More customers came and were seated but the place never got crowded, not even half-full; it was just so big.  Maybe it gets more crowded on Friday and Saturday for the live music.  They played some music over the PA system including the Macarena to which a couple of servers briefly danced.  They were still very attentive, refilling my water and asking if I needed anything.

After I finished they brought me my bill.  Despite making a non-menu item special for me, they charged me for the relatively low-priced Fish & Chips ($10.99).  I tipped them extra for being so accommodating and then I walked back in the cold wind to the hotel.  It was a great meal for a seafood restaurant in a land-locked state.

Wednesday, February 11 was the second day of my 3-day conference for work in Nashville, TN.  They let us have one hour and fifteen minutes for lunch.  I thought this was enough time to walk the 2/3 of a mile from the hotel to Arnold’s Country Kitchen where I had eaten lunch the day before and greatly enjoyed it.  Another conference attendee who I had first met at the previous conference in Indianapolis came with me.  We walked nearly one block to the southeast, but a thunderstorm of rain and strong winds made the walking difficult.  My umbrella flipped a couple of times.  We decided to go somewhere closer and spotted Fiesta Mexicana less than one block south of the hotel on 4th Street.  Getting to the entrance required climbing a fairly steep driveway and passing an elevated parking lot behind the restaurant.

We entered into a kind of parlor area.  There was a blackboard on an easel with some specials listed.  The hostess came and seated us at a table near the bar.  It seemed like an older building with large rooms and high ceilings.  There was some Mexican and tropical themed décor on the walls and tables.  The menu was fairly extensive for a Mexican restaurant in Nashville.  They had all the usual Mexican dishes: burritos, enchiladas, tacos, quesadillas, etc.  They served things in combinations or a la cart.  They had separate menu sections for Platos de Pollo (chicken dishes), vegetarian dishes, and especialidades.  They also had some less common dishes such as Parrilla Mexicana (chorizo, shrimp, chicken, carne asada, and carnitas), fajitas texanas, and Bistec a la Lampiquana.  The menu seemed similar to La Parrilla back home only not as extensive.  I was leaning towards getting fajitas as I normally do at Mexican places, but decided to get something less expensive because I wasn’t sure about my work’s per diem budget.

They didn’t bring our food right away but it didn’t take too long.  My Pollo a la Mexicana was pretty good.  They complied with my request to hold the sour cream.  The chicken was very good, flavorful but not too spicy.  The flour tortillas that came with it made delicious little tacos.  The Mexican rice on the side was also good but the best parts were the vegetables: the grilled mushrooms, onions, and peppers, and the raw lettuce and guacamole.  They made the meal very good and very substantial.  My colleague finished more quickly than I did.  After we were both done we waited for our waiter to take our checks.  We soon figured out that we had to pay at the register.  After doing so we returned to the conference.

 My colleague, who works for Noridian in Fargo, ND, mentioned that he plays broomball that’s like ice hockey only they wear suction cups on shoes rather than skates.  He travels around with his team and once in Italy some of his teammates wanted to go to a Chinese restaurant.  We likened this to eating at a Mexican restaurant in Nashville.  He also mentioned that he met a broomball team owner from Socal who seemed very wealthy.  He asked the owned what he did and the owner said he was a master baker.  My colleague didn’t think a master baker could be as wealthy as this owner and inquired further.  He learned that this master baker had the bun contract for all the McDonald’s restaurants in the Socal region.  We returned to the conference and I later learned that my coworker and her husband who also came to Nashville had tried Fiesta Mexicana and liked it so much that they returned there to pick up lunch the next day.  Who knew you could have decent Mexican food in Nashville?

 I first heard about Jack’s Bar-B-Que while researching online for places to eat in Nashville.  It seemed like a good dinner option since unlike many good places there, such as the meat-and-threes, Jack’s stayed open for dinner.  Most of the other dinner options consisted of bars with live country music.  My coworker, her husband, and I attempted to go to Jack’s for dinner the first evening we were in Nashville, on Monday, February 9.  Unfortunately, it was closed for a private party so we went to Rippy’s instead.  For the second evening, Tuesday, February 10, my coworker and her husband caught a ride to an upscale mall where they ate at CPK.  I decided to try Jack’s on my own.

Just like the previous evening I walked north on 4th Street, crossed 4th and Broadway and quickly arrived at Jack’s.  The streets were crowded with people, some in jerseys, who were going to see the local NHL team, the Nashville Predators, play the Detroit Red Wings at the Sommet Center.  Jack’s was open for business and it wasn’t too crowded, a little over half full.  I guess the fans had left to see the game that started at 7 pm.  I had considered attending the game but I figured I could attend a Kings game back home if I wanted to see the NHL.  I later learned that another attendee of the conference I was in Nashville to attend is a big hockey fan.  Perhaps next time we’re in Nashville we can go to a Predators game.

I entered Jack’s and noticed it was different from most dinner places in Nashville in that it didn’t have live music or even a stage for live music.  It was fairly small.  Customers order at the counter in the right back of the restaurant.  Above the counter is a large menu with barbecue favorites including pork shoulder, beef brisket, and Texas sausage.  They also have sides such as macaroni and cheese, green beans, and baked beans.  I placed my order and they served it up right in front of me on a tray.  Then I went to find a table.

Jack’s has many tables for two consisting of two small booth benches with a small table in between.  I found that the benches were low with well-worn cushions.  This made the table seem high when I sat down.  There are a few tables for larger groups.  The place has very dim lighting.  It also has high ceilings with game heads such as deer on the walls.  I sat down at a small booth near the window but then noticed someone from the conference sitting at another booth so I went over to sit with him.  He works as a statistician for Noridian in Fargo, North Dakota.  I enjoyed hearing his Midwestern accent that differed from the Southern accents of the natives to Nashville.  We talked about statistics and his background.  He has a PHD and has taught statistics at the college level.

The food I ordered was very good.  Like the barbecue I had at Rippy’s the evening before, my Texas sausage from Jack’s did not come with barbecue sauce.  But the sausage still had a great smoky flavor.  It came sliced and in a hamburger bun.  For one side I had the green beans that were pretty good and cooked to the right consistency.  But what really made my meal was the other side I had:  fried apples.  It was like apple pie without the crust, sweet with just a bit of tart apple flavor, and it was a good amount, too; more than just a spoonful.  It was like having dessert for dinner.  The other conference attendee ordered a different barbecued meat option.  It looked like a pork shoulder and it looked like it came with sauce.  After we finished we returned to our respective hotels.  My jacket and cloths smelled a bit like smoky barbecue; definitely not a bad thing.