LWLies 77: The Roma issue – On sale now!

Mex­i­can writer/​director Alfon­so Cuaròn makes movies to cher­ish. He’s an artist more inter­est­ed in slow cook­ing a work and only serv­ing it when it’s absolute­ly per­fect. Even those expect­ing great­ness from this preter­nat­u­ral­ly tal­ent­ed will be shocked at how expan­sive and emo­tion­al his new film, Roma, real­ly is.

He has tak­en the oppor­tu­ni­ty to plun­der the archives of his own mem­o­ry and tell the light­ly fic­tion­alised sto­ry of a maid work­ing for a well-off fam­i­ly in Mex­i­co City in the ear­ly 1970s. It doesn’t cleave to con­ven­tion­al sto­ry­telling modes, instead chart­ing the heady peaks and trau­mat­ic troughs of a life lived in an era of social and polit­i­cal tumult.

This issue is a mon­u­ment to the mon­u­ment, explor­ing the hours of prepa­ra­tion and self-exam­i­na­tion that go in to the pro­duc­tion of a per­son­al epic.

On the cover…

Span­ish illus­tra­tor Nuria Riaza looks for inspi­ra­tion in the cin­e­ma, tat­toos, sci­en­tif­ic illus­tra­tions, old pho­tographs, antique objects and, above all, the women in her family.

“I can talk about any­thing using a ball­point pen and paper, set­ting my own rules, always chang­ing,” she says. ​“I draw with a pen because that way I learn to accept that each mis­take is part of the process. For this project I had to change my omnipresent blue tones to black. It was quite an hon­our and a chal­lenge mak­ing a cov­er about Roma, a Cuarón film that I want so much to see. It is a per­son­al film which speaks about roots, women and fam­i­ly. And, it’s also a work in which all the details matter.”

Artists fea­tured inside the issue…

Lau­rène Boglio, Jon­ny Wan, Andrew Bas­tow, Jason Ngai, Béa­trice Bloom­field, Sophie Mo and Simon Hayes.

In this issue…

Alfon­so Cuarón: Observe the Moments
We meet the Mex­i­can mae­stro who explains how he made his vision for Roma – a detail-dri­ven, mono­chrome ode to his maid and nan­ny – a glo­ri­ous reality.

The Sto­ry So Far… An Alfon­so Cuarón Ret­ro­spec­tive
The signs of great­ness were always there, as we scan back through the writer/director’s eclec­tic film­mak­ing career.

The Lit­tle Things
Pro­duc­tion design­er Euge­nio Caballero explains how he recre­at­ed Alfon­so Cuarón’s child­hood home.

Filmed in Glo­ri­ous Black and White
The sto­ry of mono­chrome movie mak­ing in the age when colour ruled the roost.

Inte­ri­ors
Sev­en essays on sev­en famous movie rooms, each explor­ing how pro­duc­tion design can imbue a work with its icon­ic edge.

Threads
The pinafore – or that time-hon­oured maid’s uni­form – goes under Christi­na Newland’s movie microscope.

In the back section…

Christi­na New­land fights off the vapours as she is grant­ed some face time with her hero, Robert Red­ford; Boots Riley dis­cuss­es the intri­cate process of bring­ing his spry work­place com­e­dy, Sor­ry to Both­er You, to the big screen; we meet Sandy Pow­ell, one of the great movie cos­tume design­ers, to dis­cuss the sub­lime cre­ations she pro­duced for Yor­gos Lan­thi­mos’ The Favourite; the great Max­ine Peake talks social his­to­ry and screen act­ing ahead of her role in Mike Leigh’s Peter­loo; and Tim Blake Nel­son tells us about slid­ing into the title role of the Coen broth­ers’ The Bal­lad of Buster Scruggs.

Plus… reviews of all the key releas­es from Novem­ber and Decem­ber, a selec­tion of stream­ing and Blu-ray must-sees and reports from the San Sebas­t­ian and Toron­to film fes­ti­vals. Last­ly, in cel­e­bra­tion of Luca Guadagnino’s remix of the clas­sic Sus­piria, we take a look at a curi­ous detail in Dario Argento’s beloved original.

LWLies 77 is on gen­er­al sale 6 Novem­ber. Sub­scribe today and get every new issue deliv­ered straight to your door.