REVIEW
❯AsALFONSO CUARÓN’s Oscar-winning
masterpiece,Roma, becomes part of the
Criterion Collection, we talk to the director
about his most personal project yet
Return
to Roma
Main: Live-in maid and
extra (Yalitza Aparicio).
Below: Cuarón chats
with Aparicio on set.ALFONSO CUARÓN HAS a good memory. And
after a decade spent in the Hollywood system,
dabbling in space epics (Gravity) and wizard
franchises (Harry Potter), the Mexican fi lmmaker
wondered if that memory might be a good setting
for his eighth fi lm. The result was Roma, a
staggeringly rich stew of life, in all its chaotic
glory. Shot on his home turf, it meticulously
recreated middle-class family life in early 1970s
Mexico City, as he remembered it — from violent
political upheavals to undisposed-of dog turds.
After winning a clutch of Oscars last year,
including Best Director for Cuarón, the fi lm now
gets the full Criterion Collection treatment, the
ultimate honour for any cinephile completist,
marking the fi rst time the fi lm has arrived on
Blu-ray or DVD. With the Criterion release
imminent, we asked Cuarón about the
experience of making the fi lm, and how it feels
to enter Criterion’s hallowed collection.This is one of the quickest fi lm ever to
make it to the Criterion Collection. Are
you excited?
I’m very happy about it. Most of my non-studio
movies are on Criterion. Some of the others,
we’re trying to, but it’s a matter of rights. But
yeah, I’m very happy that Criterion added it to
the collection. Also, I’m extremely pleased with
the work done in this edition. I mean, not only
in terms of all the time that we took to do the
transfer for the DVD and the Blu-ray — the
Blu-ray, I think, looks particularly amazing —
but also the whole edition that Criterion put
together. It’s really, really good.What is the process for you with Criterion?
Do you get closely involved?
Yes, I do. They’re very respectful of fi lmmakers,
and they’re highly collaborative. They are a small
team, but they have an amazing taste, obviously
in cinema, but also in terms of editorial taste.
We’re including a documentary that was shot
around the making of the fi lm that I think gives
a good insight into the very peculiar process
of making Roma. There are essays by diff erent
writers that complement the whole experience.
The extras are really good — the curation of
the photographs in the little booklet that
comes inside. I have to say
they work very closely with
fi lmmakers. Some fi lmmakers
don’t have the time or don’t
want to get to get involved.
Some, frankly, are dead
— they have the works
of the masters, of course.
But they manage to keep
the consistency.In that new doco, there’s
a fascinating moment
where you say that the fi lm
triggered a crisis in you.
Have you looked at your
life in a diff erent way since
making the fi lm? ❯