Sheep in a Box, a film by Hirokazu Kore-eda

I hesitated to see this film – the trailer showed robot children. But I trust Kore-eda, maker of Shoplifters (story of a makeshift family supporting each other in their poverty), La Verite (in which Catherine Deneuve plays an aging movie star, Juliette Binoche her neglected daughter, and Ethan Hawks as Binoche’s husband), and Broker (in which a black-market adoption broker hosts a family of orphans) – Kore-eda is a kindly and astute portrayer particularly of children, respecting their perceptions and needs and honesty. So I saw it, and I’m glad I did. 

A couple – she an architect, he a building contractor, suffered the accidental death of their 5-year-old son, Kakeru, two years earlier, and his absence has left a hole in their lives nothing can fill. They visit a company called ReBirth, which rents humanoid robots made to resemble the dead, programmed with their family memories, to ease the grief of bereft parents. They agree to a trial, and bring home the robot. It cannot eat, nor get wet, can’t smell or taste – her husband, skeptical, calls it a Roomba. 

But this Kakeru simulacrum, now apparently seven, with a sweet calm nature, a child’s curiosity, and snuggles with his “Mama,” charms them despite their misgivings. Over time, both parents fall under its spell – it’s comforting to believe this so-familiar robot child is their son. The film’s title comes from Antoine de Saint-Exupery's children’s book The Little Prince, in which he demands the aviator draw him a sheep. It’s too old. Draw me a sheep! The next is another failure. Then the aviator draws a large box, with air-holes, and tells the youth his sheep is inside. The Prince is delighted – this sheep is exactly what he wanted. 

I won’t spoil your viewing by telling you more, beyond observing that once again, Kore-eda displays his great love for children. And as I’ve come to expect (well, not find surprising), the film-maker shifts narrative scope midway through – after we’ve settled in with these characters, he puts them at the center of a larger picture. Resolution at this higher level challenges them, and us, to a different world-view.

Roma, a film by Alfonso Cuaron

If you know anything about this much-lauded film, you’re already aware that Roma is a slice-of-life based on Alfonso Cuaron’s childhood, seen primarily through the experiences of the family housekeeper. Shot in lustrous black-and-white, with the camera mostly in the middle distance - the frame of a nearby observer - the story immerses us in personal and national travails of the early 1970s in Mexico, primarily in Mexico City.

The parents are upper-middle-class intellectuals, and their home in the eponymous Roma neighborhood is rich with the trappings of that life - books and lovely furnishings, spacious areas for dining, TV-watching, and family activities. Each of the four children has his/her own room, but they all share Cleo, who wakes them, helps them dress, with her comadre Adela makes them breakfast, and gets them all off to school. While they’re out she’s changing sheets, collecting laundry to scrub on the roof and hang to dry, cleaning, running errands. At the end of the day the cycle is reversed - again the family is fed, tea is fetched for the husband, Cleo tucks in the children one at a time, singing each to sleep. At the end of that long day, she’s in the kitchen washing and putting away dishes for tomorrow. The two young servants live in a small room off the garage, and the daily rhythm of their lives will look familiar to any homemaker - cooking, cleaning, sweeping, scrubbing, and tending to the endless needs of others.

The family’s lives are disrupted, and the way they cope highlights the central role Cleo plays in their world. She may be a paid lower-class addition to the household, but when it comes down to it, she is a member of their family, bossed but also cherished and, yes, loved.

Cuaron’s passion for detail is clear in all the camera takes in - a busy clinic, a hacienda where they go for holiday, Cleo and Adela’s day off, the street vendors, bands, and protest marches that crowd their neighborhood, the 1960s and 70s cars, ubiquitous dogs, jets overhead reminding us they live in a large city. The credits are extensive - he invested much of himself in this homage to his family and particularly to Libo (his Cleo stand-in), to whom it’s dedicated.

The density of images brings to mind Ingmar Bergman’s wonderful late-career film Fanny and Alexander, which celebrates the textures and visual richness of a warm and open life, in high contrast to the stark asceticism of his usual priests and patriarchs. Though Bergman’s film was in saturated color, the detail, the wondrous individuality of each object picked out by the camera, is the same. It reminds us that children often remember in vivid specifics what adults consign to categories: dogs, or windows, or cars. We are richer for Cuaron’s exquisitely-shared memories.