Think it takes balls of precious Mexican steel to come back after delivering a $700 million earner like Gravity (2013)—created fully inside a severely controlled environment, literally approximating outer-space—with a film like Roma (that recently dropped on Netflix), that is so inherently internal, starring non-professional actors, set in a household, chiefly decorated with personal family memories, that one wonders if Alfonso Cuaron, the director for both, is actually the same guy, only a few years apart!
But then again, I'm pretty certain every movie-buff worth their salt distinctly remembers when/how they caught the teenaged road-trip Y Tu Mama Tambien (2001)—in my case, totally stunned, sitting quiet for much after, in my room—to not be surprised by Roma at all.

Y Tu is how we first got to know Cuaron—around the same time that we were equally struck by the director Alejandro Innaritu (Amorres Perros; 2000), with Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth; 2006) joining in, to form a rather coincidental trio of the most exciting, contemporary Mexican voices on the global scene; somewhat in line with the American Spielberg-Lucas duo, from the generation before. At their best, what sets Cuaron, Innaritu, del Toro apart? Audacity of ambition, for one. The fact that they possess distinctly original voices, for sure. But more so their ability to apply exquisitely textured production design, camera-work to draw you into a unique movie universe, sometimes sprinkling it with magic of an inexplicable kind, which great movies are made of.