Alfonso Cuaron‘s “Roma,” shot in black and white by Cuaron himself, is always going to be on Netflix for a rewatch, not just that, but in pristine 4 to boot. Of course, the recently released Criterion Bluray version, which I own but have yet to watch, must be of even higher quality. I’m not here to compare and contrast both of these versions, but wouldn’t it be great if we could also get a “color version” of Cuaron’s film?
There’s a new 72-minute making-of doc called “Road To Roma“ now available on Netflix and, wouldn’t you know it, some of the more memorable sequences in the doc are shown in color! In “Road to Roma” Cuaron looks back on how he managed to splatter personal childhood memories onto the screen to create his great and artfully rendered movie. Set in 1970 Mexico City, the success of “Roma” came in how vividly captured these small moments turned out to be.
The colorized scenes featured in “Road to Roma” are eye-opening, mostly because they feel so unexpected. Imagine if color versions of “Dr. Strangelove” or “8 1/2” were unearthed from the vaults, cinephiles would rejoice. It’s the exact same thing with this newly unearthed “Roma” footage. We’ll never really know if Cuaron’s film would have played better in color, mostly because I doubt Cuaron would ever release such a version, but just the fact that we have some footage to whet our appetites with and make us ask the “what if” question is enough to sustain this debate for years to come.