Roma, written by Alfonso Cuarón, is about Cleo, who represents Libo, one of the “two women [that] raised [Cuarón].” (Ordona, Michael) She works for a wealthy family headed by a doctor, Señor Antonio, and a teacher, Señora Sofia. Roma is a drama based on Cuarón’s childhood and it depicts Cleo’s struggle through life in a way that parallels the struggle going on in Mexico at the time along with the one going on within Cuarón’s own family.
Roma’s story opens on the protagonist, Cleo, as she does her work throughout the house. She’s very methodical and rhythmic in the way she does things, as if she’s worked for a long time to develop her perfect system. Her biggest problems are from Borras, the family dog, who defecates copiously in the front patio and lunges at the man who brings oranges in the mornings. Her life is filled with hard work, but she feels like she belongs to the family. However, she believes she exists in a lower status within the family. She takes care of the four children, Pepe, Sofi, Paco, and Toño, and is even called “Mom” by the younger ones (Cuarón, Alfonso 4).
Even though Cleo enjoys her life, there are already signs of danger in the world of the story. At dinner, Paco tells a story about a child that threw a water balloon at a soldier. He says that “a friend told [him] that a kid in his cousin’s school was killed by a soldier because he threw a water balloon at him.” (Cuarón 8) At the time, Mexico was ruled by “Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI” (Torrealba, Isabel) and it was treated like a dictatorship. There were efforts made to suppress any kind of public unrest, hinted at by the story about the soldier and the water balloon, and foreshadowing the larger conflict with the Halcones later in the story.
The Halcones, or The Falcons, were a militant group trained undercover by the Mexican government. Their primary role was to look young enough to blend in with student protestors so that they could act against any protest that wasn’t accepted. Sometimes, they were even ordered “to initiate violence, as if they were students, so the police and military could claim they were provoked.” (Torrealba) The Halcones come into play in Roma because of Cleo’s love interest, Fermín.
The first scene with the antagonist, Fermín, is the inciting incident. He and Cleo decide to ditch their movie plans with another couple. Instead, they go to a room where Fermín, naked, shows off his routine with a “pair of nunchaku,” (Cuarón 28) and tells Cleo about how martial arts saved his life. It will be revealed later that Fermín is part of the Halcones. It is a great scene for characterization for both of them, as it portrays Fermín as a warrior with a tendency to show off and Cleo as absolutely lovestruck. They sleep together after this and their relationship becomes more tethered. It seems as if they both really love each other. However, even though the relationship between Cleo and Fermín seems to go well at the beginning, it will not end that way. Cleo needs to gain freedom and independence by loving herself, but for now, she loves Fermín.
While Cleo’s story is going on, there is another one that is closely related playing out. Señor Antonio and Señora Sofia’s relationship is strained from the beginning, and as Cleo’s relationship with Fermín thickens, Sofia announces that Antonio will be going to Quebec for a study. At this moment, she becomes a single parent and will rely on Cleo more and more to look after the children.
Soon after Antonio leaves for Quebec Cleo tells Fermín that she may be pregnant. They are getting intimate in a movie theater, and when she tells him, Fermín leaves to go to the bathroom and never comes back. Sofia and Cleo both have lost their significant other and must learn how to live independently. This is the end of act one as everything has changed. Everyone's relationship is strained and there is a general feeling of loneliness for Cleo and Sofia both.
A significant theme in Roma is the paradox of feeling lonely while being surrounded by loved ones. Cleo and Sofia love each other and the kids love them both like mothers. So really, neither one of them is alone. However, when Antonio leaves for Quebec indefinitely and Fermín ditches Cleo after learning about the pregnancy, it leaves a vacuum in both of their lives. The parts of their lives that should be shared with a significant other are going to have to be undertaken alone, and it feels like this sliver of loneliness is magnified. Even though they are surrounded by loved ones, they are alone.
Another major theme explored is the roles of women vs those of men within society. Cleo and Sofia are both clearly portrayed as extremely strong and independent people. They work hard, and when it is called upon, they completely take the role as leader of the family. This theme is touched upon during the scene at the ranch in which people are shooting bottles. All of the men are doing the shooting until one says, “what, ladies don’t shoot?” (Cuarón 64) At this point, one of the women takes one of the guns and starts shooting bottles. Cuarón was clearly influenced heavily by the women in his life growing up, and he portrays his high level of respect in Roma.
A device used often by Cuarón is foreshadowing. He does it with the water balloon story first but continues on, especially to foreshadow the death of Cleo’s baby. Sometimes, it feels as if there is too much, and the outcome of the story becomes too clear too early. The scene with the jar of pulque shattering is an example of this. Cleo does not want to drink for fear of harming the baby, but is convinced to. When she is about to take a sip, the jar is knocked from her hand and shatters. It feels too on the nose and also like it is saying the same thing as other scenes that foreshadow, but less effectively.
For example, there is a scene in which Cleo looks at the newborn babies in the hospital. She is looking at a premature baby in an incubator and she is completely fascinated by it. She watches until, “suddenly - A great block of plaster falls off the ceiling and lands on the incubator, covering it completely. ” (Cuarón 59) This too could be considered on the nose, but it doesn’t feel this way. It comes earlier in the story than the other scene however, and it seems like either scene would be better without the other. Still, this is the one that feels like a more effective way to foreshadow the same thing.
Another unrelated moment of foreshadowing happens right at the very end. Pepe, the youngest child, has a saying in his dialogue about when he was grown up where he comes up with ideas about his past lives. Right before Sofi and Paco get pulled into the ocean forcing Cleo to save them, Pepe asks Cleo, “Did you know when I was grown up I was a sailor? … I drowned in a storm.” (Cuarón 125) This line foreshadows the conflict that is about to happen in the water, but makes the outcome a twist. It implies that somebody will drown, but everybody is saved.
Cleo’s life changes again the next time she sees Fermín in the midpoint twist. It’s been a long time since they’ve spoken and he is avoiding her. She finds out where he trains by asking Ramón, his cousin and her friend's boyfriend, and he reluctantly tells her. While watching Fermín train, Cleo performs the same feat of strength as the great Professor Zovek, who teaches them martial arts. It adds to her characterization as a person much stronger than her appearance. When the training is over, she talks to Fermín, who denies ownership to the baby and tells her that, “if [she doesn’t] want [him] to fuck [her] up real bad, … [her] “little one” too… [to not] ever come looking for [him] again.” (Cuarón 89). Prior to this scene, Cleo held on to hope that Fermín would do the right thing, however, he shows here that he has no intention of being involved with her or his child’s life.
After Fermín confirms his intention of abandonment, Cleo becomes absent. She had been holding on to a hope that no longer exists and it shows. She lets Borras’s poop gather on the patio and she can’t hold him back when the orange man comes, letting him chase the man out of the yard. She is also much quieter, and even though she was quiet to begin with, her new mood juxtaposes her loving and hardworking one from earlier.
At the same time, Señora Sofia is slipping as well. She wrecks the Galaxie, the family’s giant black car, first while bringing Cleo to the doctor and again while drunk, trying to fit into the less-than-roomy patio. Señor Antonio had been the primary driver and parker of the Galaxie, but it has been revealed that he is planning to be away forever, having fallen in love with another woman. When Sofia wrecks the Galaxie for the second time, she feels the connection between her and Cleo’s situations, telling her that, “we are alone. Always. Even though they say we aren’t.” (Cuarón 98) This concept is a falsehood that both characters wholeheartedly believe at this point in the story. To them, it feels like they have nothing but themselves. They aren’t yet seeing and appreciating the people around them that love them too.
Their situation also effects the lives of the children, especially Paco and Toño. They fight relentlessly and it even becomes violent when Paco throws a stone egg at Toño’s head. It’s an important scene because it portrays how the lives of the role models effects the lives of the kids.
To Cleo and Sofia, it feels like their situations are happening to them and them alone, but that’s not true. They have become sad, lonely, and disconnected, and the children feel it and become this way too. They all have each other, but they have momentarily forgotten this.
The conflict starts to ramp up heavily at the end of the second act. On a historical date, June 10th, 1971, Cleo and Sofia get caught in a department store during a protest that gets shut down by the Halcones. It’s a horrible event in which many people are killed called the “Corpus Christi Massacre” (Evans, Michael) Student protestors break into the store that Cleo and Sofia hide in and are followed and killed by Halcones. As one of the students is shot, Cleo realizes that one of the Halcones in the store is Fermín.
This is the point when the external conflict in Mexico meets the more internal conflict of the story with Cleo. Political unrest has been felt and touched upon previously, but now, the two stories are connected, and it seems that even though Cleo was in love with him, she didn’t know all that much about Fermín to begin with. He doesn’t do anything to hurt Cleo while they are in the store, but knowing more about who he really is has only made Cleo feel more alone. Not only is he absent and threatening, he is also involved with all of the death and violence that Cleo has to witness. She realizes that she doesn’t want to have his baby at all.
All of the conflicts in the department store culminate when Cleo’s water breaks. She’s both caught in the middle of the massacre and having her baby at the same time. Sofia, Cleo, and their driver Ignacio rush to leave but find themselves caught in traffic. It is an hour and a half before they are able to get to the hospital. Once she gets there, she sees Antonio, who never went to Quebec but instead stayed in the city with his mistress. He tells her that it will be okay but declines to go with her into the delivery room. In the delivery room, the intensity rises even more, “Cleo screams. ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!’ [and] it’s a deep cry. A primeval scream from time immemorial,” (Cuarón 110) and the doctors can’t hear the baby’s heartbeat.
Cleo struggles and struggles through her childbirth until, “the baby is expelled between Cleo’s legs and onto the hands of Doctor Vélez, who receives it. The baby doesn’t cry or breathe. It is flaccid and hangs like a rag.” (Cuarón 110) The doctors try to resuscitate it, but are unable to. Cleo is able to hold her baby for a moment and learns that it is a girl before she is taken away from her.
After Cleo’s horrible experience in the delivery room, she becomes even more absent and removed from life around her. Sofia decides to sell the Galaxie and the family goes on vacation to the beach to say goodbye to it. Cleo comes, but she is still disconnected from the rest. It seems like she will never be happy again. However, the story resolves when Paco and Sofi get lost in the ocean. Sofia has left Cleo to watch them and they’ve waded out further than they were supposed to, despite being warned to stay close due to Cleo’s lack of ability to swim. Cleo desperately searches for them as, “she looks impotently at the waves, which Paco and Sofi wrestle, insignificant in a fierce and indifferent ocean that drags them further in.” (Cuarón 127) In a courageous moment, she goes after them, rescuing them both before they are pulled out too far.
When Sofia sees them coming out onto the shore she comes to meet them panicking and Cleo breaks. Speaking about her daughter, she says, “I didn’t want her… I didn’t want her to be born.” (Cuarón 129) and Sofia comforts her, telling her that “It’s going to be alright” (Cuarón 129). Here, Cleo is revealing her deep guilt for ever having a moment of not wanting her daughter. She feels as if the terrible outcome in the delivery room is her fault and she’s been holding in those feelings the whole time. However, almost losing Paco and Sofi shows her that they are close enough to being her own children that she’ll never really be alone. She’ll always have them and she needs her catharsis on the beach to move past her feelings of guilt.
During this vacation, Sofia tells the children the truth about Antonio, resolving their story as well. She reveals that the beach trip is actually a cover so that he can come move his things out of the house. It’s strange and sad, but knowing the truth is better to the children than feeling the lie. Sofia has multiple scenes where she lies about Antonio’s whereabouts and the dialogue differs from that of when she is telling the truth. When she lies, it feels like she wants to tell the truth, but she can’t out of fear of harming the children. When she does tell the truth, the dialogue makes it feel like she is having her own moment of catharsis.
When they all get home, everything is both back to normal and completely different at the same time. Cleo is much better and more present, and she helps everybody again, falling back into her rhythm. However, the house is emptied of the bookshelves and many other things that belonged to Antonio. It’s a lot to get used to, but Cleo acts as a parental figure with Sofia, and eventually the children come around, realizing that they have many, many more adventures coming in the future. Cleo has always been there for them more than Antonio has, and their deeper connection to her shows.
Depicted within the closing image is Cleo moving through the house again, helping the family, as, “step by step [she] ascends. Yet further up, beyond the roof, the sky is pure.” (Cuarón 137) She is a person who has had to go through incredible hardship, but through it she only ever helped and loved the people around her. Like the sky, she is pure, and it is clear that Libo, the person who Cleo is based on, is the same way and Cuarón loves her for it.
Roma is a beautiful story about the hardships of two amazing women. Cleo is an incredible character, and she is a big influence on lives of the people around her. Her story is paralleled by the hardships that Señora Sofia is going through along with the ones in Mexico as a whole. It depicts a life within a harsh and unforgiving system, but on a grander scale proves that a person can make it through anything with the right support of loving people.
Works Cited
Cuarón, Alfonso. Roma. Roma, Netflix, 2018, attachments.academyart.edu/rest/attachments/open/49327157.
Evans, Michael. “The Corpus Christi Massacre Mexico's Attack on Its Student Movement, June 10, 1971.” The Corpus Christi Massacre, 2003, nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB91/.
Ordona, Michael. “Alfonso Cuarón Reveals the Hidden Layers of 'Roma'.” La Times, 2019, www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/la-en-mn-alfonso-cuaron-20190130-story.html
Torrealba, Isabel. “The Surprising Piece of Mexican (and American) History at the Center of Roma.” Slate Magazine, Slate, 21 Nov. 2018, slate.com/culture/2018/11/roma-corpus-christi-student-massacre-el-halconazo.html.