Roma (2018): Cinematography and Visual Storytelling Analysis

Introduction: Style and Setting

Roma, directed by Alfonso Cuarón, is a black-and-white film that is stylish in nature yet reflective of reality. It is a period drama set in Mexico in 1970. The film opens with a long still shot of water swooshing over the tiled floor of a driveway within a Mexico City mansion. The sounds are like waves washing over a beach — they foreshadow a climactic scene at the end of the film. The credits roll over this opening scene, and when they finish, the camera pans up to reveal the heroine of the film: the diminutive Cleo, a live-in maid in the mansion of an upper-class Mexican family.

The main ideas of the film are captured evocatively but subtly through the camera's framing, the use of light and shadow, and the suggestive nature of mise-en-scène. For instance, a great deal is suggested about the patriarch in the scene where he attempts to navigate his large Ford into the driveway inside the home. He backs up, pulls forward slightly, bumps into a wall, reverses, corrects the wheel, and repeats the process slowly and painstakingly while smoking a cigarette and ashing in the car's ashtray. The camera never shows his face throughout the scene; instead it shows only his hand holding the burning cigarette, then cuts to a wheel being corrected, a side mirror clipping a corner, a fender bumping a pillar, and so on. Everything is suggestive, and dramatic moments are highlighted by this kind of stylized approach. What it says about Antonio is that he is a mysterious figure whose presence is always elsewhere: he possesses these things — this house, this car — yet struggles to fit his own life into them, which is why he is having an affair and why the matriarch, Sofia, will eventually divorce him. The theme of fidelity is depicted in another way through long, slow, ponderous shots of Cleo performing her duties in the home, caring for the children, holding the dog so that it does not escape. Every long, panning shot in which Cleo is situated reinforces the idea that she is part of the home — she is the heart of the family, humble as she may be.

Camera Movement and Placement

Camera movement in the film is carefully thought out. Most shots are still shots, angled to show something specific — dishes being washed, or the maid picking up children after school. When the camera does move, it is typically a tracking shot or a panning shot. For example, in the scene where the woods catch fire during the New Year's celebrations, the camera moves from right to left in a slow tracking shot that shows the full extent to which everyone is pitching in to put out the flames. The camera always moves at the same pace, is never rushed to capture something, but glides along slowly as if set on auto-pilot and allowed only a limited range. The lens is extra wide, however, to pick up as much action as possible, so it never feels as though anything is left out.

Camera placement ranges from close-up shots to long shots of action on a grand stage — such as during the fire or during the opening sequence when Cleo is cleaning the house. Long shots help to establish the scene, while close-up shots provide an intimate perspective, such as when Cleo sits in bed while her boyfriend practices martial arts naked in the room. As a work of cinematography, Roma is distinguished by its disciplined refusal to rush or sensationalize any moment.

Shot Framing and Point of View

One of the most important aspects of the film is shot framing. Every shot is framed with symmetry in mind. Whether it is the shot of the family watching television or the shot of the nude martial artist, every frame is balanced and symmetrical. The television, for instance, is in the center of the frame with an object on either side of it. The martial artist is framed from waist-height and is himself framed from behind by the doorway to the bathroom.

This type of framing allows Cuarón to employ a point-of-view camera style that is at once personal yet clinical. One feels present in the action without quite being part of it; the action feels close, but the premeditated movements and pacing of the camera — the angles and the framing — feel so calculated and predetermined that the viewer always remains a viewer rather than someone immersed in the action. Camera angles are typically waist-height, but since the main figure, Cleo, is very short, the angles never seem too low. High-angle shots, low-angle shots, eye-level shots, and reverse shots are rare if used at all. Cuarón does not present the film in conventional cinematic ways. It is like a cross between Wes Anderson's set obsession and Terrence Malick's artistic nuance — somewhere in the middle, never quite finding a home in either sphere.