‘Roma’ is the latest entry in the Mexican director’s acclaimed filmography, and Karim Noorani discusses what makes it so powerful

(Alfonso Cuarón / Netflix / Photo Illustration by Nathan Graber-Lipperman)

Editor’s Note: The writing below contains some spoilers from the film Roma. If you wouldn’t like to have any of the plot details spoiled, we suggest reading this after watching the film.

Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma is the most visually striking film I have ever seen, and it doesn’t use an ounce of visual effects or color.

The lack of color is actually crucial to creating the sense of nostalgia prevalent throughout the movie. Roma’s poignant imagery — coupled with a steadily building plot — makes Cuarón’s approach to the film all the more alluring. “It’s an approach of the past seen through the present,” Cuarón said in a press conference.

The conceptual duality behind the film appears in Cuarón’s cinematography as well. To accentuate the film’s reminiscence, among other elements, Cuarón refines Roma. He makes the film adhere to monochrome, utilize distinct motions, and encompass more external set pieces. However, in the realist film realm, manipulating a movie is a big no-no; when filmmakers insert themselves in a cinema, it detracts from the sanctity of the experience. Realist filmmakers prioritize what’s being shown over how the film presents itself.

Cuarón redefines those notions in Roma. He shows cinematography doesn’t have to be invisible to be realist. By contrast, Cuarón uses his formalist style to preserve the film’s humanity and authenticity. Needless to say, Roma’s underlying tidbits are a lot to digest. However, nothing conveys the audience’s role in the film more than the opening sequence.

Cleo, Roma’s main character, washes the courtyard in the beginning of the film. Cuarón captures the action of the scene through a bird’s-eye angle, typically avoided by filmmakers due to its extreme setup and disorienting effect on viewers. The symbolism of the angle, nevertheless, gives the audience all-seeing power — the subject matter is typically pinned down and at the mercy of viewers. In Roma, Cuarón juxtaposes the traditional connotations of a bird’s-eye angle by depicting an opening in the water’s reflection. It’s a subtle film-making choice that imbues a profound message.

Similar to the bird’s-eye angle, viewers have a certain sense of power in a film. For one, cinema is plastered over a screen for our consumption. And second, most movies are made with the viewing audience in mind. The filmmakers have a purpose — whether comedic, cinematic, or philosophic — for people to see the film. In this scene, Cuarón tells the audience not to go into Roma as a means to an end; he simply doesn’t afford us that level of control, or privilege, in the film. It’s a brief, murky, and imperfect glimpse that Cuarón depicts. To him, Roma is meant to be an awakening and — above all else — provide perspective.

Cuarón integrated perspective into his film-making long before developing Roma. In his 2006 apocalyptic film Children of Men, Cuarón used various camera ploys to encompass the outer setting while also following the plot. He lagged, turned, and broadened the scope of the movie’s frame frequently to illustrate the world around his characters. Cuarón made it clear the plot of Children of Men was not the entire experience; how the film was being told mattered just as much as what it is was telling. The humanism of the movie’s plot seeped into Cuarón’s cinematography. Here’s a clip of the film exemplifying these concepts:

Children of Men was a profound movie, but it was an alternate reality. The dystopian setting and uncanny plot impeded a connection to viewers. The audience was not going walk out of the film and suddenly be threatened by human extinction.

Enter Roma, a more intimate, faithful picture of human experience. The film is about a middle-class, Mexican family and their maid, Cleo. The plot centers around Cleo and Sofia, the family’s mistress, experiencing struggles in their relationships, which are unique but still credible circumstances. Moreover, Cuarón uses his cinematography to depict and comment on different societal issues.

Cuarón’s camera use in Roma is similar to Children of Men, but just a tad less obtrusive. The frame lagging or running away from characters is not as common as simply staying unchanged during action that moves off-screen. There are many moments in the film where Cleo goes to perform a task and the shot stays put.

In this scene, Cleo goes inside a shed for one of her chores, and the camera waits outside for 30 to 40 seconds. The screen is actionless during that time — a stark contrast to modern movies which constantly stimulate viewers to keep their attention. In Roma, this unusual shot actually begs greater notice from its viewers, forcing them to speculate what might happen next.

Cuarón’s patient camera use also accentuates the film’s authenticity. Repeatedly cutting a film only detracts from a realistic experience. If we were physically in the film, we would not spot every close-up or see behind every door. In this way, Cuarón illustrates a nuanced approach to realist film-making.

Beyond a cinematic level, Cuarón is highlighting that Roma is told in the third-person. Likewise, we’re not privy to every nitty-gritty detail of these characters’ lives. There’s a level of privacy and control they still maintain. The film’s concealment is embodied by this shot:

Sofia’s son only learns of his father leaving them by listening to a conversation outside his mother’s bedroom. Therefore, Cuarón spotlights his own constraints in this story by using a stationary camera at times.

When the camera does follow the action, Cuarón’s follows along at its own pace. In some instances, Roma pays no attention to characters falling in and out of the shot. Here’s a brief clip from Roma’s trailer that highlights this:

While Cleo cleans the house, the frame moves at a steady pace. It becomes clear Cuarón is emphasizing the setting just as much as he is Cleo. The movement of the frame emphasizes the visual context, but also the shots themselves show much more than a typical film.

Look at how much of the natural scene Cuarón includes in the frame! The visual context is crucial to the effect. The shot doesn’t just depict Cleo taking a breath, but the scene itself is a breath of fresh air to her. The distinction is subtle, but it highlights the film’s commentary. Roma is saying perspective helps you come to grips with life’s difficulties. That perspective doesn’t have to be just sublime either — making your problems feel tiny and insignificant. Observing yourself as part of a broader system can help you gain purpose, for better or worse.

One of the complex and slightly troubling allegories in the film is Fermine, Cleo’s love interest. After finding out Cleo is pregnant with his child, Fermine walks away from her right then and there. The film brings him back later as part of an anti-government movement. He sees Cleo in that scene, and even contemplates killing her. A crucial aspect to Fermine’s character is his obsession with martial arts. Here’s what he says about it early in the film:

“I grew up with nothing. My mother died when I was a kid. I moved with my aunt to the slums. There my cousins beat me and I met the wrong crowd. I started drinking, and then huffing. I was dying. But then I discovered martial arts. And then everything came into focus.”

In this scene, Cleo observes Fermine practicing martial arts. Look at the linearity in the shot. The students, including Fermine, stand in a straight line and observe their instructor. Each of them is holding a straight martial-arts stick. Even the setting encompasses straight wooden poles and congruent shadows.

Cuarón puts these elements in the shot to evoke a sense of uniformity. The discipline is beneficial to Fermine because it puts his life into “focus,” but those elements also comment on a suppression of his autonomy, which contributes to his horrific acts later in the film.

A crucial element to the film not yet mentioned is the language: Roma is entirely in Spanish. To some viewers, this might be a turnoff, and I get it. The movie experience is vastly different when you have to read the subtitles. But the inclusion of Mexico’s native language, even if you can’t understand it, is key to the film. Language prescribes a different set of values to the film and subconscious of the audience. It makes viewers recognize that the cultural guidelines characters operate under are different from their own.

In the film, feminism isn’t as vastly spread; this is why female characters ascribe so much importance to their male counterparts. The film has biased body image notions: Sofi, Sofia’s daughter, is told out loud not to eat desserts to avoid getting fat. Humanity across socioeconomic class isn’t present in Roma, either. In her most vulnerable moments, Sofia uses Cleo as a means to vent her anger.

There are profound messages in Roma from the plot and filmmaking sides, but they don’t necessarily have to coalesce into a single bottom line. This is what I believe Cuarón’s message was from the start. In literary terms, I compare Roma to a stream of consciousness narrative mode. Not everything makes sense at first glance, but if single elements are analyzed, you can find definite answers to the film’s complex topics. Moreover, Cuarón’s formalist style ascends Roma beyond just a glimpse; it transforms the film into a societal commentary.

Karim Noorani is an editor at UNPLUGG’D and the host of ‘The Unplugg’d NBA Show.’ You can follow him on Twitter here.

Alfonso Cuarón Reinvents Realist Filmmaking With ‘Roma’

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