The Unclad Soul

The Oscar-winning  film, Roma (Best Foreign Language Film), tells the story of an upper-middle-class  Mexican family in Mexico City in the 1970s. There is chaos everywhere. In the streets. In political unrest. And in this family. The father, a businessman who is often away on trips and who eventually leaves, apparently for another woman, causes profound crises within his struggling family. The wife and mother, Sophia, tries to carry on, hiding the truth from her boisterous four children. But as times goes on she craters under the reality of her failing marriage and enveloping loneliness and she tells the children their father is not coming home. Teresa, Sophia’s mother who lives with them, is a matronly sympathetic and caring older woman, but she is helpless in corralling the rowdy children. It is Cleo, played by first-time actress Yalitza Aparicio, who as nanny and housemaid, successfully manages this disordered family. The character is based on a tru...

The Oscars this year were unique in many important ways. For one thing, there was no host. Comedian/actor Kevin Hart had been invited to be the host, but after it was revealed he had used some homophobic jokes in the past he was asked to publically apologize. Instead, he withdrew from hosting the awards night. Diversity was huge this year. There seemed to be an attempt, whether genuinely sincere or the Academy trying to shed its elitism and whiteness, to be truly inclusive. Three Oscars went to Mexican film director, Alfonso Cuarón. Black actors won other major categories: Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Regina King) and Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Mahershala Ali). The film, Black Panther, won 3 Oscars. Rami Malek, an American born actor to immigrant parents, won the Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role. The Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role went to British actress, Olivia Coleman. And first time ever to act, Yalitza Aparicio in Roma, was a candidate for Best Act...