Review of Roma (2018) by Erica S — 30 Dec 2018

Hereï¿ 1/2(TM)s why critics are almost universally salivating over Roma:

1. Itï¿ 1/2(TM)s about Latin American people and takes place in Mexico.

2. Itï¿ 1/2(TM)s about a poor brown-skinned female domestic servant.

3. It depicts bad things done by men to women.

4. Itï¿ 1/2(TM)s supposed to depict the Mexican writer/directorï¿ 1/2(TM)s own childhood.

5. If they donï¿ 1/2(TM)t pile-on the praise, the critics are afraid of appearing racist.

Keep the very same thin-to-nonexistent storyline with a different setting and characters, and Iï¿ 1/2(TM)m willing to bet it would not have a 96% critic score. As someone raised by a single mother who was abandoned, this film should have resonated with me. I get what Cuaron was trying to do by juxtaposing the two women from different classes experiencing male abandonment. But when all is said and done itï¿ 1/2(TM)s a just-okay, plodding story told with striking filmmaking techniques that nowhere near lives up to the critical hype. Itï¿ 1/2(TM)s the ï¿ 1/2Boyhoodï¿ 1/2Â? of 2018. Or ï¿ 1/2The Crying Game.ï¿ 1/2Â?

So give it a cinematography Oscar. Just donï¿ 1/2(TM)t tell me itï¿ 1/2(TM)s the Greatest Film of the year or the decade or the century. Iï¿ 1/2(TM)m sick of being played by mostly white, limousine-liberal critics. Because itï¿ 1/2(TM)s autobiographical doesnï¿ 1/2(TM)t make it a masterpiece, it makes it a self-indulgent vanity project.

Oh, and can we talk about the family dog? Nothing about this film bugged me more than that. This dog spends its entire existence in the carport, itï¿ 1/2(TM)s never allowed in the house, never played with and never taken anywhere. Why do they even have a dog? The kids show no interest in it, and kids love dogs. The family doesnï¿ 1/2(TM)t even take it along when they go to the beach. Itï¿ 1/2(TM)s completely ignored. Sadly, this is the way many pets are treated in reality even today. But it made the family seem cold to me and as a result I could not emotionally invest in them or care what happened to them.