“I can never remember whether it snowed for six days and six nights when I was twelve or whether it snowed for twelve days and twelve nights when I was six.”- Dylan Thomas, A Child’s Christmas in Wales
“Your mother and her prayers can’t help us”― Antonio, Bicycle Thieves
“there are always in gatherings such as this sadder thoughts that will recur to our minds: thoughts of the past, of youth, of changes, of absent faces that we miss here tonight. Our path through life is strewn with many such sad memories: and were we to brood upon them always we could not find the heart to go on bravely with our work among the living. We have all of us living duties and living affections which claim, and rightly claim, our strenuous endeavors” ― James Joyce, The Dead
Alfonso Cuaron brings us back home; specifically to his home. Roma, the eponymous neighborhood in Mexico City, comes to life during the turbulent 1970s. But this is not The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, in which a noble family is insulated from political upheaval. The domestic trauma stays domestic unlike Cuaron’s last feature, an outer space thriller entitled Gravity. Ironically Roma wrestles with another primordial force in nature, the matriarch. Being a innovative story-teller the director bring a new definition of that sacred office. As a master technician he can breath life into all parts of the universe. The craft behind the colorful, captivating dazzle of an exploding space station is equally deployed in making a mesmerizing tableau of the steady, black and white, diurnal rhythms of an upper-middle-class Mexican family.
The opening credit sequence, a floor being slowly scrubbed, is a powerful mirror image of the space-age special effects of the last project. The titles flow while the aged mud bricks are slowly bathed in mop water. This banal description belies the evoking of a prelapsarian innocence. The quietness hides the demands of a bold director putting an audience on notice: put away the endless chatter of the present! You are entering a quieter era, but don’t be fooled into thinking it is less dramatic. Romais the story of women’s ability to endure the barbarity of male privilege; but it is not a polemic. It is the tale of real suffering and hardship, yet it fosters a nostalgia for a bygone era. Cuaron celebrates the joy of the past without hiding the hardship. He is a master craftsman who meticulously frets over the details of each frame. Paradoxically that exacting work gives birth to a seemingly simple tapestry of the truth of yesterday. Strangely this informs those facing the difficulty of today.
The film takes place during Mexico’s dirty war against the left. This time period coincidences with women, within the same family, facing betrayal by their partners. The protagonist, Cleo, is a beloved domestic who has a front row view to the disintegration of her employer’s marriage. She is also struggling with a surprise pregnancy. Cuaron’s decision to place a lowly servant at the center of the drama is revolutionary. This unremarkable nanny/housekeeper is a surprising match for the captivating familiar paterfamilias archetypes. The standard trope is to have the king preside over his castle; Big Daddy pontificates in Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, the Prince rules in Visconti’s The Leopard, Don Corleoni terrorizes in Coppola’s The Godfather… Cuaron’s matriarch is playing a quieter, longer game while the men strut and squawk.
We first meet the head of the household, a physician, as he pulls his car into the narrow driveway. He rolls his vehicle over the same tiled floor we see in the opening credits. The focus of the sequence is on his arm fastidiously shifting gears as an extended cigarette smolders between his fingers and classical music blares from the radio. There is pomp as his absurdly large, shiny, American limousine-like car barely squeezes against the ancient stone walls. The chrome mirror is nearly severed as the smoke settles and the orchestra plays on. The king of this castle is an officious tyrant; not so much evil as ridiculous.
This knave, however, is a giant compared to Cleo’s paramour. We first meet him in a hotel room where he has just made love. He comes out of the bathroom delivering the only moment of nudity in the film. Men bearing their parts delivers a comedic touch and Cuaron plays it to the hilt. The doctor, in his flashy car, was a pompous ass but he fails to compete with the absurdity of a man, in the raw, showing off his martial arts “skills” by twirling a shower rod. Cleo hides her guffaws under the covers but our big little man is too much of a narcissist to understand she is laughing AT him. His cut body only amplifies his foolishness. If youtube had existed he would, no doubt, be featured in a number of cringeworthy videos. He goes on to join a right wing para-military group led by a TV personality who has pretensions of being… a superhero. He leads his army in calisthenics/yoga in a caped costume with a cowl. This is probably a nod to fellow Mexican director Inarritu’s Birdman, a wonderfully comic paean to the absurdity of stardom.
Cleo is the only person able to follow the ersatz shaman’s most difficult yoga pose. The army men stumble in place as she, rigidly, commands a perfect position while being completely ignored. The boyfriend finally stops pretending not to see her and reels-off violent invectives while denying parternity. He ads she is merely “a servant.” This comes from someone whose idea of showing his might consists of flashing martial arts moves in a mirror. His complete abdication of responsibility matches Cleo’s boss, the doctor, refusing any monetary support for his wife and four children. He has left them to pursue a young single woman. The physicians’s chef d’oeuvre, however, is emptying their former apartment of “his” furniture. Roma, however, revolves around women, rather than male boorishness.
Cuaron’s slowly crawling camera carefully uncovers the tribulations of Cleo and the titular matriarch of the house. Pain is the ink of this remarkable portrait and Cuaron uses it to delineate our heriones’ numerous journeys. One such outing is an amazing sequence in which the mother and nanny take their children to the movies. The heart of Mexico City bristled with the forgotten street energy before the ubiquitousness of chain stores and screen technology. Interestingly the family is heading to see the film Marooned. There is a small clip of an astronaut stranded in outer space, which is obviously the seed of Cuaron’s Gravity. Cleo anchors the scene as she rushes up the street in search of her wayward charges. They accidentally encounter their father on a date.
Cleo is the mainstay, once again, in another magnificent foray into the countryside. A rich friend has taken pity on the abandoned family and invited them for a getaway in his magical hacienda. Cuaron borrows a sequence from Malick’s magisterial biblical visual poem set in America’s rural heartland, Days of Heaven. A fire erupts in the sprawling forest. All the guests and their servants rush out and pitch a primordial battle against the rushing flames. There is the backdrop of class struggle as some dispossessed peasants are thought to have been behind the arson. The focus, however, is on Cleo and her boss and their emotional struggles. Despite the beauty and old world opulence, these two women desperately hold their own against awkward social constraints. Cleo is being introduced to men by supportive friends, despite being reluctant. Her counterpart fights off an advance from a fellow guest who sees an opportunity for a dalliance. Whereas Malick focused on the men’s burning passion, Cuaron sees through the smoke of objectification. He captures the point of view of the objects of desire.
There is a unforgettable moment when Cleo encounters a grotesque monument to subjugation that masquerades as a loving tribute. The Lords of this manor have a tradition of mounting the heads of all the dogs that have been a part of the family. They are exquisitely displayed, creating a fearsome uncanny-valley. One half expects these beloved canines to start wagging their tongues. Such is the fate of all who are given honorary membership in the family. Cuaron continiually illustrates the limits of this status. There is a scene in which Cleo is invited to watch TV with the parents and her charges. The children clutch her hand. They are genuinely more attached to her than their biological parents. The serenity of the group gathering is broken when the father directs Cleo to get him a beverage. The children object but the mother dutifully directs Cleo to her task,while quieting the children.The father knows that servants should expect the veneer of family, and nothing more. The most damning example of his cruel facade is exposed when Cleo is facing near death in the hospital. Rather than accompany the terrified woman, he gives Cleo’s female physician an excuse for being absent. The Doctor’s words are the metaphorical equivalent of the show of love for all those pets at his friend’s hacienda. Cleo is given the family script but, the male directors of this world, relegate her to being a prop. She is expected to do the heavy lifting, both physically and spiritually, but her reward is ending up as emotional taxidermy. Ditto for the Doctor’s wife, who, along with his children are metaphorically, forgotten trophies of a time gone by.
Cuaron endlessly points out the pomposity of male privilege and its mask of power. In reality the white flag of abandoment is flown every time trouble erupts. There is a recurring motif of an army band, made up of young cadets, who proudly march by the house in new uniforms. They are nowhere to be seen during civil unrest. The legions of thugs, made up of the same absurd fake ninjas who worship the fraudster TV superhero, are hired by the government execute the peaceful crowd. This spills over into the department store where Cleo is shopping for her crib. It is the GRANDMOTHER who comes to the rescue when the shots are fired and the water breaks. It is the MOTHER who comforts the children with strategic bromides until they are ready for the truth. She delivers the “Daddy is not coming home” speech with a masterful combination of restraint and compassion. This follows Cleo’s rescue of the children in the ocean despite not being able to swim. There is no basking in heroics. She is merely doing the right thing by pushing herself beyond what is humanly possible. This tour de force scene is a denouement of all the emotional turmoil and finally brings all, Cleo, mother and children, into that hug that binds for eternity. It is the antidote for the harrowing hospital birthing sequence. This showcases the best of male efficiency twinned with female compassion. It is a excruciating few minutes. It evokes the horror and pathos of E. Eugene Smith’s photo Tomoko Uemura in her bath, which portrays a mother cradling her poisoned daughter. It is a maelstrom of emotion and Cleo’s dignity and strength hold firm. Her power eclipses all the men, and most of the women. It is everlasting.
It is interesting to note that Cuaron is the son of a prominent international scientist yet Roma, is dedicated to Libo. Liboria “Libo” RodrÃguez, a domestic servant of Mixtec heritage who was hired into his family’s household when he was a child. She became his beloved spiritual mother, despite having no standing in the conventional sense. The memories of her tenderness, however, are the cornerstone of Roma. There is a brief interlude where a child is playing cowboys and Indians and is “shot.” The boy goes to his nanny. She is toiling amidst of the never-ending laundry lines which adorn the roof. She patiently breaks away from her chores and carefully plays along. They lie down at opposite sides of the table-like outcropping. The top of their heads are touching as they pretend to be dead. This is one of the myriad of life-affirming moments so delicately drawn by this careful director.
Given Cleo’s status as a nanny/washerwoman it would be easy for class to be the center of the narrative. The feature length social commentary Beatrice at Dinnershowcases the cauldron of rage fomented by a spoiled upper class elite towards those in their service. Cuaron eschews being a polemicist. His inspiration is a subtler rendering of the upstairs downstairs divide brilliantly brought to life Renior’s masterpiece The Rules of the Game. Romatakes Renoir’s vision of class and station and places the unseen in plain view. This might sound ponderous, but the slow focus on the ordinary leads to a paradigm shift in experiencing family life.
Strangely the children are a peripatetic blur of agreeable narcissists who tumble in and out of scenes unmindful of the mothers’ emotional mayhem. That is as it should be. Possessing an innate obliviousness to the burdens of adulthood is what it means to be a child. The adult Cuaron, however, embraces the mature perspective. He vividly illuminates all the sturm und drang but glorifies the selfless angels, rather than the myriad of showy devils. The fancy cars and kung fu moves are no match for Cleo. Children might be repulsed by her fastidiously scrubbing dog-shit from the cobblestone driveway. In adulthood, however, these same children might reflect on her work ethic combined with her emotional generosity. Rather than wallow in bitterness wrought by cruelty, Romabasks in a glow of gentleness. Cuaron reminds us childhood’s journey ends with a realization that cleverness and winning acclaim can never hold a candle to the calmness of being in the moment. Youngsters are consumed by flash and spectacle but sleep in the cacoon of knowing “mommy is there.” The film’s slow pans reveal the warmth of a home sustained by nurturing women. Cuaron asks us, as adults, to reflect on those who were always there to, metaphorically and physically, hold our hands. Romais a thank you to the unsung and unfashionable heroes of our youth.
Perhaps, through Cuaron’s efforts, the world is taking note. Now, for the first time in the history Mexico’s Vogue magazine, a native beauty is being showcased on their cover. It is none other than Yalitza Aparicio, the actress who plays Cleo. This small gesture shows the power of Roma’s vision. After all these years Cuaron has helped us all see the beauty of Cleo; or the real-life Libo. The half a century old, deceivingly slow, black and white, meandering tour of an old Mexico City neighborhood has the power to change our contemporary world view. He is putting capes and cowls on the unseen army of strong women languishing in the shadows. They are suddenly highlighted; or more precisely the glasses dissappear and we realize Clark Kent’s real identity.
These superhero matriarchs have grit that is lacking in the father’s ephemeral adrenaline rush. The power of Libo is embracing and eternal. The patriarchs tend to be fleeing and fleeting. In Roma, do as the women do. Boys will be… boys. Home is where mothers take care of business. A warm embrace is more powerful than an army of martial arts experts. Percy Shelley’s Ozymandiascaptures the folly of the those men who have the pretense of being the king of kings. The traveller reads the boasts carved into the stone ruins of a monument to the great leader. He then looks up to see the wreck and “lone and level sands” that “stretch far away.” Cuaron shows us Cleo is standing on the horizon in a plain dress. She is smiling with the sigh of someone who has seen it all before. You might miss her. You have to look closely. She holds no degrees or bank accounts. She is unable to pull strings or call-in favors. Don’t mistake her for being powerless or unwise. She never loses sight of what is important. Most critically, she can guide you home when you’re in the desert.
Cuaron, like all great artists, simply lifts the veil on what is always there. Cleo was in Damascus Syria 10,000 years ago, Mexico City in 1961 and probably within a few miles of where you are presently sitting. This film can be seen as an extension of the work of the biblical writer Sirach. I have adjusted the pronoun in the following excerpt of these holy passages. After all Romais the memorial for those ‘who have no memorial.’
And there are some who have no memorial, who have perished as though they had not lived; they have become as though they had not been born, and so have their children after them. But these were women of mercy, whose righteous deeds have not been forgotten; their prosperity will remain with their descendants, and their inheritance to their children’s children. Their descendants stand by the covenants; their children also, for their sake. Their posterity will continue for ever, and their glory will not be blotted out. Their bodies were buried in peace and their name lives to all generations. People will declare their wisdom, and the congregation proclaims their praise.
