Directed by: Alfonso Cuaron
Starring: Yalitza Aparicio, Marina de Tavira, Marco Graf, Diego Cortina Autrey
It took me a couple of days to gather my thoughts about Roma. I read the glowing, almost genuflecting critical reviews and I started to wonder if something was wrong with me because I missed the boat. Roma succeeds in authentically capturing a time and place near and dear to director Alfonso Cuaron's heart. There is no doubt a personal attachment to Roma for Cuaron, but for me the movie wasn't just slow, it stopped. Roma has a "you had to be there" feel to it, like someone telling a personal story or joke he or she no doubt thinks is hilarious or meaningful, but you sit there and nervously smile along for fear of revealing your boredom.
I have no issues with stories which quietly build characters and reveal their personal natures in dramatic ways. But, Roma is stilted in the drama department. We see things happen, but they are about as involving as an acquaintance's Facebook video clips posted on someone's timeline. The person who shot them may adore the subjects, but all you see is people engaging in activity who have little if any connection to you. Roma is more professionally photographed, but the effect is still the same.
Roma is not a movie about plot as much as it is a document. The focus is Cleo (Aparicio), the maid for a well-off family in the Roma section of Mexico City in the early 1970's. The family itself is undergoing some underlying tension due to a largely absent father who goes away on business seemingly for weeks at a time. Cleo is considered part of the family, but that doesn't mean she won't be chastised for failing to scoop up dog poop in the driveway or keeping lights on. Cleo herself soon becomes pregnant after hooking up with a friend of her cousin's. The baby's father flees from her life right after she breaks the news to him, and she will soon face the prospect of being a single mother. The movie soon drifts along quietly, and the lack of a score soon becomes noticeable, which I'm sure was Cuaron's intention.
This may sound like the setup for a rich family drama, but Roma never builds to that or even a satisfactory payoff. Shot in lush black and white cinematography, Cuaron adores the visuals to be sure, but the subjects are a crushing bore. The reviews I've read for Roma highlight Cuaron's visual flair and emotional power, and I agree with the former while being completely not feeling the latter. Roma means a great number of things to many people, but I can only speak for myself when I say the movie works aesthetically while failing on other levels. Cuaron won an Oscar for directing the gripping space drama Gravity (2013), and is a skilled filmmaker, but Roma didn't resonate with me as clearly as it did others.
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