dolores c
OK but very slow. Interesting topic but best picture (I do not think so).
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
03/30/23
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Audience Member
I saw the movie Roma at Violet Crown a couple weeks ago, and I can't get the imagery out of my mind. The movie is shot in black and white, which gave it a nostalgic, almost romantic feel.
The writer and director, Alfonso Cuaron did a brilliant job of incorporating magical realism in a finessed and vaguely humorous way. Set in 1970-71 in Mexico City, the film is a grown man's homage to a maternal figure of his childhood, the family maid. But it is also a swipe at the infantile men who had license to remain puers, neglect their families, and instantiate violence and harm with virtually no consequence to themselves. The film exposes (literally!) the male ego with his primary phallic tools--including and especially himself.
THE CAR
The male persona--the ego, the self-importance, the vanity--takes center stage here. One brilliant scene early in the film introduces the enchantment of Papa and the anticipation by his lonely, desiring wife, surrounded by the excitement of the children, "Papa's home!" We watch as the family's car fills the entire screen as it surrounds it's way to the house and into the car port. The car turns into a kind of gigolo, a 1971 Galaxy like car, sleek, sexy and wide. We see the masculine hands expertly handling the metal gear shift and steering wheel. We can smell the cigarettes in the pull out ashtray and gin on the driver's breath as the he skillfully finesses the hunk of metal and steel through the cozy hacienda's gate just barely fitting between the patio walls, shifting the car into park as we stare straight into the steel, majestic "W" hood ornament to confirm that the King has arrived.
THE ROD
Another scene shows the young stud lover of the family maid, Fermin, who pulls the motel room's shower curtain rod so that it becomes his Jedi weapon. As foreplay he performs, totally naked, swift martial arts drills like a seven year old boy, but with a grown man's body. The phallic imagery requires no explanation.
THE GUN
It is Christmas, and the family celebrations are festive and lush. It is reminiscent of the movie, Ice Storm, which about the decadent 1970s upper middle class family life. After a lusty time indoors, the celebrants are outside at a family ranch. Someone runs around dressed up in a pagan-like "wild man" running around screeching happily. The darkness is illuminated by campfires, and while the children play, the grownups chat, and some are shooting guns into the trees. The Wildman sings a ballad like song. There is one woman identified as the "gringa," who also shoots, and we hear her steely voice saying to someone getting up to shoot, "Always aim a loaded gun toward the ground." The row of men with the one woman expertly shooting pistols was surreally reminiscent of Ibsen's Hedda Gabbler, that great play about provincial men and kept women.
THE VIOLENCE
The movie takes a dark turn when Cleo, the family maid, is pregnant and is searching for the baby's father, named Fermin. She finds him practicing martial arts drills in military style precision with a large group of sweaty but determined young men at a soccer field. Their guru like leader arrives and gives them a kind of zen like instructions before he leads them into a simple exercise of closing his eyes while standing in a yogic tree pose. The men laugh until the guru tells them to try it. We watch the hundreds of men wobbling and collapsing, unable to hold the pose, then the camera turns toward pregnant Cleo, perfectly balance in the pose, while everyone else wobbles around her.
Later, Celo is shopping for a crib in a department store, when the violence from the "Dirty War" spilled into the store, and assassins with guns hunt down and kill a man. We watch for what felt like an interminable amount of time as Fermin, who is gripping a pistol, stands tensely staring at Cleo, who is standing next to her employer, the family grandmother. Is he going to point the gun at her and kill her as he promised to do at the soccer field?
All of this in black and white.
MY LAWYERS
And of course, as with so much that I see and experience in this world, it makes me think of the corruption and violence, yes Mr. Willie and Mr. Hays, the violence I experienced by licensed lawyers who violated ethical and professional standards by treating me with contempt and neglecting the legal issues that I paid them to perform on behalf of a teenage boy. The actions and attitudes of these lawyers was exactly what Flannery O'Conner describes in her brilliant short story, A Good Man Is Hard To Find. While Alfonso Cuaron's film particular to a specific time, place and people, the violence is universal.
The violence of men and the power they continue to hold is the basis of so much literature. And yet they continue to reign trauma and terror over us all. Why?????
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
02/21/23
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Audience Member
Unspoken sadness. Hardworking and loyal Mexican maid.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/02/19
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Audience Member
I enjoyed this simple yet dynamic "sensory" movie with many ironies. Cleo is a warrior.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/24/23
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Audience Member
Federico Fellini's meandering look at Italy's capital is film of frenzied contrasts and audacious allegories. A semi-autobiographical smush of stories, with Peter Gonzales playing a young Fellini, the film focuses on anything from fascism and first-time arrivals to the city, to bawdy brothels and mining discoveries during the digging of Rome's metro.
The film is ultimately plotless, yet alive with poetic imagery. Enduring scenes include cabaret chaos, shots of hippies being hammered with police truncheons and a chilling ecclesiastical catwalk. Not to mention a beautiful POV closing sequence with biker gangs speeding through the city's piazzas.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/14/23
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