Roma
(2018): Written and directed by Alfonso Cuaron. Starring:
Yalitza Aparicio, Marina de Tavira. Running Time: 135 minutes.
Rating:
4/4
The
film opens with the camera staring at the ground, at the patterned tiles of a
floor of some sort. But then water tinged
with soap washes over it, opening up a reflective window of the open sky above,
wavering and unsteady, but there. A plane
flies across, up and away into the ether.
This duality between the Earth and sky, between the hardness and dirt
and scrambling nature of people’s lives and the free openness of the sky above,
is arguably the most important theme of Roma,
one it touches on again and again. This
is a film of almost undefinable power, and it is one of the year’s best.
In
its purest distillation, Roma depicts
a year (give or take) in the life of Cleo, a maid working for a wealthy family
in Mexico City in the year 1970. She
lives, she works, she loves, she becomes pregnant and struggles with the
changes this brings to her life. Beyond
this deceptively simple narrative structure, though, is a wealth of commentary
on the nature of class, of race, of rapid societal change, and of the constant,
unceasing contradictions and paradoxes inherent in human existence. Like the camera, we are bound to the Earth
while constantly feeling drawn, time and again, to the sky above us.
More
than anything else, though, it is a movie about women, and about how they are
forced time and again to pick up the pieces left broken at their feet when men
fail. Cleo’s flake of a boyfriend
abandons her immediately after learning she is pregnant, in a scene that is one
of the film’s most acutely constructed; they are sitting in a movie theater
when she tells him, and as the scene plays out, the final scenes and credits of
the movie in the background mirror Cleo’s growing realization that, like the
movie, something unreal has just ended.
The lights slowly come back on, and she has no choice but to return to
harsh reality.
This
is paralleled within the extended family Cleo works for; while she takes care
of both the house and the children (in many ways, it feels like she’s the one
actually raising them), we glimpse in bits and pieces how the parent’s marriage
falls apart, until, in yet another masterfully crafted sequence, it becomes
clear that this father, too, is also never coming back.
Once
these stakes are laid out for both Cleo and her employer, it is easy to draw
quick assumptions about how things will play out, but the film constantly takes
turns that are never quite what we expect.
The class (and possibly also racial) divide between these two abandoned
souls is unavoidable, but not entirely unbridgeable; there is a clear bond that
starts to form, forged in the fires of abandonment and of the simple
necessities that drive them to continue on and to once more put their lives
back together. What this builds to in
the second half of the film, for both Cleo and the family, is one of the most
emotionally resonant endings of any film I’ve seen this year, and I dare not
spoil it, except to say that it will shatter you, in more ways than one.
Even
though this film is already available on Netflix, it is worth seeing on a big
screen if at all possible. This is one
of the most beautiful and well-crafted films of the year. There is a clear and present purpose in every
shot, every framing, each sweep of the camera.
I have already mentioned the shots comparing the ground and sky, which
begin and end the movie. I also think of
the many shots of Cleo where the camera follows her as she seeks something, but
we never see what she sees; she is gazing off-screen, yearning for or seeking
something that is beyond our field of vision.
The way that a favored car of the family father is shot as both he and
others struggle to park it in the family’s tiny garage is also loaded with
symbolic imagery that can only be seen to be appreciated. The car itself later plays a key part in one
of the film’s most viscerally satisfying payoffs.
Something
that the distance between the camera and its subjects allows is an appreciation
of how precisely every scene is staged; there are very few close-ups, but also
not too many far-away shots. For the
most part, the camera is in some sort of middle distance, where we can see the
characters clearly but also the details of the world around them, with all the
moving parts that are to be found in a bustling city, but none of them are
there by accident. This is most
effectively conveyed in arguably the movie’s grandest scene, a recreation of
the Corpus Christ Massacre. I could
literally spend hours doing commentary on each and every shot in this
movie. It is that detailed.
This
movie is far more than just technical artistry, though; in Yalitza Aparicio’s
portrayal of Cleo, we have one of the best breakout performances in years. She had no formal training or experience in
film acting prior to being cast, yet carries a weight and gravitas to each
scene that even most veteran performers aren’t able to pull off. The entire cast is stellar- even bit roles
for relatives and friends around the family are not left to waste- but it is
Aparicio who will provide much of what will, I expect, be this film’s
considerable staying power as one of the decade’s best.
When
considering the character of Cleo, though, the question of whether or not
Cuaron is the right person to tell this story has already come up in some
discussions; Cuaron dedicates the film to the maid who, he has said in
interviews, provided for and raised him when he was a child much in the same
way Cleo does; the title comes from the name of the neighborhood in Mexico City
where he grew up, and one of the boys in the family seems to be a pretty clear
stand-in for himself. He is still in
contact with her and spoke with her regularly while writing and producing the
film, which does lend the film added authenticity. However, it is still worthwhile to consider
whether a man can ever be in a position to properly tell this sort of story,
especially one that specifically focuses on particularly underrepresented
groups like the indigenous minority both Cleo and Aparicio herself are
from.
One
reviewer, Richard Brody from the New Yorker, delved into this question in
detail, and is of the opinion that, intentions aside, the film blots out or
ignores Cleo’s perspective, given that we very rarely directly hear from Cleo
what she thinks or wants. For him, this
is a fatal flaw that undercuts what the film is trying to do, but after much
thought, I’m not sure I agree. Not to
knock on someone with Brody’s pedigree (or indeed anyone else who takes issue
with the film), but I consider it rather better that Cuaron tried to go for a
more general approach, one more focused on nostalgic memory than natural
realism. It would, perhaps, have been
even more arrogant and privileged for him to assume that he could tell a film
that tries to explicitly explore the inner thoughts and feelings of Cleo. We see her experience so much without
directly saying anything, but Aparicio’s performance and bearing in the role
provide reams of silent information for us to consider and ponder. I usually tend towards the opinion that the
greater films are the ones that try to say less, and instead present more,
letting us mull things over for ourselves rather than telling us outright what
to think.
Regardless
of what one ultimately thinks of it, though, this is that rare masterpiece that
deserves to be seen and contemplated by everyone, regardless of their
background. I would say they don’t make ‘em
like this anymore, but the truth of the matter is that this kind of artistic achievement
has always been a rare feat; most filmmakers have never made one like this, but
Alfonso Cuaron has, and you owe it to yourself to experience it.
-Noah Franc
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