Awards season is in full swing, and so it Ouposter Mhatt’s epic trawl through alll of the biggest runners and riders this year. This time he looks at big favorite Emilia Pérez.
Emilia Pérez
Emilia Pérez Is directed by Jacques Audiard, written by Audiard alongside Thomas Bidegain, Léa Mysius, and Nicolas Livecchi. It is based on the novel by Boris Razon.
It stars Zoe Saldana, Karla Sofía Gascón, Adriana Paz, and Selena Gomez.
A Mexico City lawyer is recruited by the head of a notorious drug cartel to help him receive gender affirmation surgery and begin a new life.
Rita (Saldana) is an established and talented defense lawyer involved in a high-profile murder case. She cleverly manages to get her guilty but famous client off.
Increasingly exhausted by the moral compromises her job demands, she is contacted by a mysterious client with una oferta que no puede rechazar.
In a secret location, she meets drug lord Manitas (Gascón) who offers her enough money to retire if she’ll set up a sex change operation and help his wife Jessi (Gomez) and their two boys relocate.
Conflicted but desperate for a way out, Rita agrees and starts putting the plan together and, with his family safe, Manitas fakes his death and is reborn into a new body and a new life with the new name Emelia Pérez.
Things are good, and lives are lived in peace until Rita is reenlisted to help Emelia to make amends with her destructive past and, after finding a new love with a victim’s widow, Epifania (Paz), she decides there is just one or three more things needed to make her new life complete.
Having her old life merge with her new one causes understandable problems and as old rivalries flare up, so do old habits, and their lives begin to spiral down the path they were always destined to.
Overall, “Emilia Perez” puts an interesting spin on the redemption story because for a while it actually seemed possible to ever placate a psychopath.
I will give the leads, Saldana and Gascón, credit as they sing and dance and deliver sincere performances which elevate the lame script, lazy cinematography, and shaky directing.
Besides yourselves, aka the critical masses, “Emilia Pérez” has pissed off people across the board; from GLAAD to Mexicans to the Spanish-speaking population at large. Director Audiard has been criticized for his inaccurate portrayal of the Mexican language, not to be confused with dialect, as the writing was plagued with inaccuracies, which is a pretty big factor in telling such a specifically regional story.
There was also some controversy about the actors hired, as none of them are actual Mexicans: Gascón is Spanish, Saldana is Dominican/Puerto Rican / American and Selena Gomez is Italian / Mexican / Tex-American. Apparently, these hirings were required to secure funding, but as the production also weirdly shoehorned Israel in as some benevolent entity, I call shenanigans.
Perhaps in a case of life imitating art, both Emelia Perez the character and the production suffer similar fates due to their parallel experiences trying to sidestep the consequences of poorly executed and selfishly realized plans.
What You Should or Shouldn’t Watch For?
This has 13 Oscar Nominations and the only ones I think are warranted are Best Actress for Gascón and Best Supporting Actress for Saldana. This was a full-on musical, but even the day after, I can’t remember a single song.
Only recommended viewing for Selena Gomez fans, Zoe Saldana fans, anyone who can’t say no to a Musical and anyone who is related to the director because when he comes to you for support, it’ll pay to know some of the background.