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Hot take: Roma

Writer's picture: AmrutaAmruta

‘Roma’ is a strikingly intimate, quiet and absorbing look at the life of a maid in the Mexico of the 70s. Fellini’s mark is present in the black-and-white cinematography that manages to keep the female protagonist firmly at the center of the film even when the camera is seeing her from a distance, a speck in the crowd. The film abounds in symbols and even throws in a few surreal sequences but never lets them overtake the real lives and personal concerns of its people.


The political turmoils rage in the backdrop only informing the principal story inasmuch as they affect the lives of the maid and her mistress. Children are both the soothsayers and the reflection of this age: they fight, pull guns at each other but cry and love in equal measure. One particular child is constantly declaiming about what he “used to be when he was older”, refusing to let grammar get in the way of his innate wisdom. When he and the maid play dead they both exclaim at the relief they feel.


Class divides aside, Alfonso Cuaron reminds us without a touch of pretension of the fragility of life, social order and the relationships we share with each other. Each frame is a technical feat and yet the director makes it subservient to the human story he wants to tell. This is a work of art that doesn’t cry to be marvelled at, so imbued is it with humility and love. Can one make a sweeping epic about the life of one maid? Cuaron’s deeply moving film is an affirmative answer.


Genre: Drama

Language: English Runtime: 2h 15min Year of release: 2018 Streaming Platform: Netflix


Hot take is a series in which I offer my first impressions of films from India and around the world.

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