Emilia Perez: Divisive Does Not Mean Good

A confounding mess

Emilia Perez released on Netflix this past weekend after rapturous acclaim in France at this past Cannes Film Festival, winning best actress awards for its three-headed trio: Zoe Saldana, Selena Gomez, and Karla Sofia Gascon. Directed by acclaimed French filmmaker Jacques Audiard in his Spanish feature-length debut, Emilia Perez became one of the year’s most divisive films as soon as audiences tasted it on streaming. Why you might ask? Emilia Perez is about a Mexican drug cartel leader who transitions into a woman, leaving his life of crime behind her. Oh, and it’s a musical. The three actresses have constantly been present all Oscar season, campaigning like their lives are on the line. The perfect combination of audience hysteria from all sides and aggressive Oscar campaigning has Audiard’s film buzzing. So, is Emilia Perez the audacious masterpiece critics claim it to be? Or is it an embarrassing, overrated misfire?

Emilia Perez begins with frustrated lawyer Rita Castro (Zoe Saldana) who drudges through several defense cases. At her wit's end defending a media mogul accused of murdering his wife despite overwhelming evidence, Rita reluctantly drafts a brief to secure his exoneration, much to her chagrin. This case compounds her feelings of inadequacy in life. Everything changes when cartel kingpin Juan “Manitas” Del Monte (Karla Sofia Gascon) secretly hires her to covertly find an avenue for him to transition into a woman, starting a whole new life as Emilia Perez. Upon doing so, Rita earns enough money to escape the shackles of her dreary life and boost her law career, while “Manitas” is pronounced dead and Perez starts a life of her own, leaving her family behind. However, four years later, Perez enlists Rita’s help to return to Mexico and reunite with her former wife Jessi (Selena Gomez) and kids. Posing as Juan’s cousin, they all live under one roof with only Rita knowing Perez’s former identity. Things get more complicated when remnants of Perez’s past pop up. Now a reformed individual no longer at odds with their inner self, Perez starts a foundation to help cartel victims while also attempting to get closer to her kids. This opens up past wounds forcing Perez to confront her dueling identities and realities. 

As a musical, Emilia Perez is a major disappointment. I’m not sure why directors insist on making musicals when they in fact dislike what makes the genre work. Joker Folie a Deux proved last month that taking a typically non-musical genre and placing it in a musical world barely pans out. Neither the songs nor lyrics are particularly memorable and even a pop star like Selena Gomez can’t make the songs come alive. Similar to Joker, Audiard attempts a naturalistic singing style that doesn’t work. It doesn’t make the singing or the characters any more relatable, rather it’s punishment for the audience. The choreography and set-pieces for these musical moments don’t particularly stand out, with Audiard keeping the same realistic, gritty style throughout. Except for one energetic set-piece set in a hospital. Yet, if you asked me what song they sang, I’d be at a loss. The film's visual style significantly influences its musical elements, with Audiard and cinematographer Paul Guilhaume opting for a high-contrast, grainy aesthetic, and a handheld, fast-cut editing approach. However, this distinctly 2000s-inspired look feels dated and largely forgettable. Most of the music has a direct responsibility in telling the story and revealing specific details of these character’s lives. Many of the songs feel like long monologues rather than moments where the characters can express what they feel inside because they can’t express it in words. While writing dialogue in verse is commendable, when the music and most of the content fall short, it’s to no gain. Some key character moments are effective, such as when pre-transition Perez candidly shares her gender dysphoria with a doctor or when her child recognizes scents that evoke memories of their father. But overall, Audiard misses the opportunity to harness the musical's unique power to transcend the diegetic world. From Fred Astaire tap dancing to Gene Kelly singing in the rain, these scenes capture emotions and magic that can only be conveyed through musical cinema. Granted, I doubt anybody expected an MGM musical from Emilia Perez, but what we get barely scratches the surface.

The underwhelming musical moments are a deep disappointment for a film seemingly about a person transitioning, since what better way to reveal who somebody is on the inside than through song and dance? With respect to the Trans issues associated with the film, I can’t say I have a position one way or the other. It’s apparently managed to offend both sides with right-wingers upset by any trans representation while the left demands the “correct” trans representation. I’m not sensitive nor particularly aware of cliched-Trans tropes that may be present in Emilia Perez, instead, I prioritize good films with something interesting to say. I don’t think we need to hold films about marginalized groups to a different standard, where in my view, that sort of thinking will set us backwards. That said, my perspective on films like these is also shaped by the broader societal discourse surrounding them, especially in light of the heightened tensions and misunderstandings in recent cultural and political debates. For one, I have concerns with aspects of the trans movement, particularly regarding changes in language and how well-intentioned debates or criticisms are often interpreted as transphobic. Now, I don’t want to get into a culture war rabbit hole because it’s exhausting for everybody involved. But coming off an American election filled with attack ads against the trans community, ones that oftentimes felt openly discriminatory, I was hoping a film like Emilia Perez would at least humanize and nuance the political talking points. Instead, Audiard embarks on a genre-bending journey that completely lacks focus. The result is an incoherent plot riddled with holes, offering little entertainment value to compensate. In a year where a film like Megalopolis was unfairly maligned for its decisions, it’s a mystery how audiences and critics have given Emilia Perez a pass. Most scenes feel like a hodge-podge of ideas scraped together without any sense of direction. Usually, I give plot holes a pass; however, when a film fails to absorb the audience by wasting time on scenes that add nothing to the characters, plot, mood, emotions, or themes, they’re hard to forgive. I cannot praise a film solely for attempting a genre-bending experience if it lacks engagement, entertainment, and depth.

Ironically, Emilia Perez suffers from an identity crisis much like its trans protagonist, unsure of what it wants to say and what kind of film it wants to be. Whatever worldview Audiard is presenting is both oversimplified and too broad. On one hand, it’s a critique of third-world corruption and the hypocrisies that it entails. Then, the film shifts its focus to condemning the patriarchy, seemingly attributing all the world's problems to men. Sometimes, it’s a call to action against drug violence. Audiard's sporadic attempts to tackle themes fall flat, as he avoids delving into their nuances where much of the social commentary is purely preached. It doesn’t help that many of these ideas are expressed in verse making the points more deliberate but less impactful. A lot of these issues also stem from poor characterization. I presume Audiard, an older, straight white male, approached Emilia Perez with curiosity and sympathy for the trans experience - a film, that at its core should be a deconstruction of identity. Unfortunately, there’s a failure to craft compelling enough characters with the proper depth and focus needed to explore these ideas. Much of the film is spent with Zoe Saldana’s character, a woefully developed one who’s dissatisfied with her life for lack of money, success, and looks (believe it or not). The film tries to conflate her subsequent rise and transformation to that of Emilia Perez just distracts from the promise of the film: the story of Emilia Perez. Then there’s Selena Gomez’s character, who ultimately feels forgettable, serving only to interfere with Perez’s efforts to reconnect with her past life. Both Gomez and Saldana deserve credit for performing in a second language, and while their presence isn’t distracting, their one-dimensional characters take up screen time that would have otherwise been spent on Gascon’s Emilia Perez.

Herein lies the rub. In a film called Emilia Perez, we see so little of her and her inner struggles. Spending so much time on auxiliary characters and adjacent themes takes away from the central question at the heart of the film: can anyone leave behind their past? Audiard explores this question through the lens of trans identity, a brave and commendable effort in a world where discussions on such topics often feel strictly off-limits. However, Audiard doesn’t have the discipline to truly wrestle with this question by focusing the story on the character herself. It doesn’t help that Perez’s past criminal life barely resurfaces after her transition. Audiard seems to mistakenly believe that physically transitioning into a woman completely transforms a person’s entire being, forcing them into an almost saintly figure who embodies all the perceived qualities of womanhood. Granted, if we could have seen Perez’s womanhood in action pre-transition, then the film would be more complete. This is where the film’s execution does not meet its potential. The story of a woman trapped in a man’s body, forced to navigate an unfair world by working in the underground drug trade to survive, is a fantastic premise—one that is merely implied but never fully explored. Seeing more of the criminal version of Emilia Perez would help illustrate how surviving in the real world only leads to her destruction on the inside. Unfortunately, we don’t see this arc and this inner pain. Instead of what could have been a fascinating crime picture, we’re stuck with a boring, meandering hodge-podge of ideas. Interestingly, plans for a prequel sound far and away more fascinating than what we have. Or imagine the enemies of Juan “Manitas” Del Monte return to exact revenge on Emilia Perez: a trans-action film. The possibilities are endless with this premise and yet Audiard chose the most inert one. [1.75/4]