Roma

IS THERE ANYTHING ALFONSO CUARÓN CAN’T DO? Who else could hopscotch from the intimacy of Y Tu Mamá También to the franchise imperatives of a Harry Potter movie to the daredevil dystopia of Children of Men, all topped off by a trip to the heavens in Gravity? He seems to be incapable of repeating himself. That streak continues with Roma, his best and most personal film yet.

A deeply felt autobiographical love letter to the middle-class Mexico City neighborhood of his childhood, the film is shot in the dreamy black and white of a long-lost home movie. While it centers on the story of a family in the early ’70s (loosely based on Cuarón’s own), it’s also about a slower way of life, a culture in the midst of unrest, and most of all, a woman who became a sort of second mother to him and his siblings while his parents were splitting up.