Alfonso Cuarón‘s Roma has already been beautifully commented on in Rinus’ article, yet the movie has proven to be an inexhaustible source of reflection (and controversy). I thought I’d write an assorted list of facts from a Mexican point of view.

1. La Colonia (neighbourhood) Roma has changed since 1971: the tragic earthquake of 1985 both devastated it and, a couple of decades later, provoked its rebirth as one of the hippest neighbourhoods in Mexico City; equivalent to Malasañain Madrid, Williamsburg in New York or the Maraisin Paris. La Roma is an old neighbourhood, its buildings are more susceptible to damage whenever there’s an earthquake; a couple of years ago during the worst earthquake in Mexico City since 1985, la Roma was badly hit and its neighbours (many of them in their 30s) were praised all over Mexico for their great solidarity and help to the rescue teams 24/7.

2. Before its Netflix release, Roma had been very poorly distributed in Mexico’s cinemas (as a protest of big cinema against Netflix). Many wanted to see it on a big screen and couldn’t find tickets. So, Cuarón and Los Pinos Cultural Centre (formerly the presidential residency), organised a free screening for 3,000 people (in the residence’s former heliport). This was the first cultural event held at Mexico’s equivalent to the White House (except fourteen times bigger in size), now vacated (the president lives in his own house) and transformed into a public space.

3. Roma’s distributors and Cuarón himself have been relentless in its promotion. In Mexico, it has been a bit tiring and over-the-top, and in detriment of the seriousness of the movie. There are instructions to arrange your living room for an ideal watching, guided visits (and special maps) to La Colonia Roma and the movie locations, a contest for the best 70’s style neighbourhood projection, i.e. hang a white bed sheet on the patio, project the movie and invite your neighbours to watch it with you.

4. Yalitza Aparicio and all that concerns her has been an absolute milestone for Mexico. In such a mixed raced / racist-in-denial country like ours, an indigenous woman is still more likely to live the life of Cleo (or worse) than the life of Aparicio. Just this morning when she was nominated for an Oscar, she was announced as the second Mexican actress to be nominated (the first was Salma Hayek). This is painfully imprecise as there is almost no common ground between one and the other. Yalitza is a poor Mixtec woman (take a look at her early Instagram feed if you have the time); almost everything that is happening to her is a first for Mexico.

5. Yalitza Aparicio was recently on the cover of Mexico’s Vogue with a phrase in Mixtec (A Star is Born). Mixtec is Yalitza’s mother tongue (and what Cleo and her colleague speak in the film). There are as many as fifty sub-languages in the Mixtec group, one of the 68 indigenous languages still spoken in Mexico. None of which are ever taught in school or proposed as a second language. As a curious note in the language category: Cleo and Sofi (Yalitza’s best friend in real life) call each other “manita”; a Spanish term of endearment I still remember from my childhood; it was mostly used in the 70s and 80s and it comes from hermanito/a (little brother or sister).

6. In Spain, Netflix subtitled Romausing Spanish equivalents to Mexican expressions: madre instead of mamá, enfadado instead of enojado, and many other vocabulary and grammar equivalents. This was endlessly ridiculed and denounced by Cuarón and many Latin American writers as an unnecessary and provincial gesture from Spain’s Netflix; it patronized Spaniards and robed the movie of its Mexicaness. It’s safe to say that even a non-Spanish speaker can figure out that mamá equals mother.

7. As Rinus’ review rightly points out, Roma is an autobiographical movie and should be seen as that. For Mexicans this is a difficult restraining exercise as it touches on many highly political and delicate subjects in a way that satisfies no one. The main subject of controversy, of course, is Cleo and her place in the family and Mexican society: racism, exploitation, machismo … no happy ending in sight for the likes of Cleo; many debates on this subject which, for understandable reasons, foreign critics have not understood in its right context.

8. Another terrible subject addressed tangentially in Roma is El Halconazo, a massacre against students (120 deaths) perpetrated by the government in 1971. The younger generation has forgotten about it and some probably won’t know what the reference is about. I knew about El Halconazo, of course, but not the length of involvement of the CIA (or of the dubious Professor Zovek) in the preparation of the paramilitary group that Cleo’s boyfriend belongs to (the Falcons).  This is too very meaningful today as in Mexico’s current violence and the way it mainly affects the underprivileged as the rest of society (and the government) watches impassible.

9. Even though the movie takes place before I was born and in a city different than mine, there are many familiar references: food brands, slang, family and urban traditions that went on for decades. An important madeleine de Proust in a film full of them is the whistle from El Afilador (The Grindstone Man?) who bikes around the Colonias offering to sharpen household knives. For as long as I can remember and in every Mexican town I’ve lived in and visited, the sound of the Afilador passing by is a fixed feature. He plays a sort of plastic pan flute that you can only buy if you are on the trade (believe me, I’ve tried!) I find this to be a good analogy for Roma and filmmaking in general, a particular sound no one else can play, it has a specific purpose, but it can activate as many reactions and memories as people are there to hear it.

Daniela, Jan 2019

*Image posted for non commercial purposes
under 'fair use' of copyright material in recommendation of the film

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