The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men Often Go Awry

It is the merry month of May. I had great plans for May. I had signed up for a photography tour In Oaxaca with Gary Goldberg. It has been 26 years since I've been there on another photographic tour with Geoff Winningham. This year the tour included visits with Mexican photographers and artists, time to photograph but also we were going to stay at Casa Colonial which is where I had stayed 26 years ago. I loved Casa Colonial, a huge garden, comfortable rooms, delicious meals, and filled with wonderful Mexican art. 

I was planning to go a few days early and stay a few days after the workshop. Unfortunately, the Pandemic changed those plans but I was thinking about the trip this morning so I opened the Oaxaca folder that had some scans of the black and white film I shot with my Pentax medium format camera. 

Digital Photography has brought many changes to the way most photographers work so looking at the scan of a film negative was shocking. Film had grain! And to print the negative you had to go into the darkroom, mix chemicals and spend hours on one image making test strips and multiple prints until you were finally satisfied with the resulting print. Then you had to spend a few more hours washing and treating the print for archivability. If you were able to finish two prints in one day, you had accomplished something. 

Looking at these negatives brings back some wonderful memories but I don't want to go back to the darkroom although I do want to go back to Oaxaca. 

This image was made just outside the village of Tlacochohuaya where we had stopped on the side of the road to look out across this wide valley with magnificent clouds hanging in the sky. 

ROMA - More Like a Poem than a Movie

When the Academy Award Nominations were announced today, my favorite film for 2018, Roma, garnered 10 nominations. Actually, Roma may be one of those films that will stick with me for a long time and becomes a yardstick for other films.

Natalia Green in her article in Mexico News Daily writes, "More like a poem than a movie -- in the Hollywood sense at least -- Roma is not for those who crave plot, elaborate dialogue or choreographed action sequences. Shot almost in docudrama style, its subject matter is daily life in all its mundaneness."

Not everyone I know who has seen Roma likes the movie but they have not put it aside. They are still talking about it and trying to understand why the director did this or included that. I loved the film and I've already watched it twice and plan to watch it again. I think it is a beautiful film shot in 1970s black and white format with the wide-angle camera moving through the house and the streets taking in life as it is occurring around the main characters. The way it captured the chaos of the street was as if one were actually walking in a Mexico City street. It was masterful the way the scenes were choreographed to also include symbolism of the current events in the 1970s.

Having been in Colonia Roma in Mexico City a number of times, I feel like I know the street where the house is located. The street sounds of bands, car motors, the whistle of the knife sharpener as well as the sound of mops being rung out and dishes clinking in the kitchen are substitutes for a musical soundtrack. The cars getting in and out of the portico was a mundane event for the family but are hysterical for the viewer. There isn't a lot of dialogue but the acting is superb.

Have you seen Roma?  What did you think? What was your favorite scene?