Who is Emilia Perez? Jacques Audiard doesn’t want to answer that question so easily. At the end of his latest musical drama (which won two awards at this year’s Cannes Film Festival), we’re still left with the same question. It’s a film that’s constantly trying to convey that Emilia can’t be defined, that her identity exists in many layers and forms. So, in response, Audiard manages to provide a kind of pastiche, capable of aiming for great heights but ultimately crashing under the weight of its own ambition. It’s clever, disorienting, ridiculous and silly – no movie this year has elicited a more extreme reaction than Emilia Perez’s. (Also read: After Gotham Award win, All We Imagine as Light wins Best International Film at New York Film Critics Circle)
A musical drama with a notorious cartel leader
Emilia Perez is a musical film, and it begins through the eyes of Rita (Zoe Saldana, who is easily taking home the award for most acting here), a civil defense attorney who takes part in a trial, which Almost despairing over the unjust state of affairs. After two silly musical numbers, she is kidnapped by Manitas del Monte (Carla Sofia Gascón), a powerful drug lord. Why? Rita must help Manitas find a doctor who can help him transform into a woman. Not only to get her gender confirmation surgery, but to send Manitas’s wife Jessie, played by Selena Gomez, and their two children to Switzerland with the lie that Manitas has been killed. The implausible plot only begins to take some shape when the most uncontrolled choice of a musical number comes into play, in which several patients sing a song about the amount of surgery that will be required. “Vaginoplasty!” “Yes!” They sing.
Manitas turns to Emilia Pérez, and it’s largely thanks to the strength of Gascón’s kinetic, wounded performance that her arc captures the film’s unsettling beats. Years pass, Emilia is reunited with Rita. Emilia will realize that there are still more desires left, which will force her to confront difficult truths about herself and her country. Just when you think Audiard is going to slow down, he takes a left turn with a new plot point. It’s like driving a car without brakes – one is bound to crash without fail. The audacity with which Audiard takes risks here is surprising, even if melodrama often takes the same path as many of Pedro Almodovar’s films. Unfortunately, in Emilia Pérez, there is no room left for reflection, dialogue or curiosity.
final thoughts
The biggest concern for Emilia Perez here is that she doesn’t really know what she wants. Is this the same director who made Rust and Bone and A Prophet? Tonally, the movie is a mess. The script is unnecessarily drawn-out and contrived, and Audiard’s direction feels overly heavy-handed in the oversized song-and-dance numbers. It doesn’t help that Selena Gomez gets a pretty thin character to bring to life, with another ridiculous subplot revolving around a new boyfriend (played by Edgar Ramirez in a thankless role). The only late revelation comes in the form of Adriana Paz, a woman who gets a new lease of life upon contact with Emilia. Their scenes are the best bits in this cruelly exaggerated debacle.
Why does Emilia fake her death? Why is her transformation treated like the death of an identity and then she sings of herself as ‘half he, half she’? Audiard, who was largely inspired by a chapter from Boris Razon’s 2018 novel Écoute, seems less inspired to spend a moment with his characters. We know very little about Emilia, about her desires and fears, about her intense passion for the interests of her country. Rita’s perspective here adds nothing relevant to Emilia’s story. The final push comes in a ridiculously predictable third act involving more guns and tears.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect about Emilia Perez is the fact that the film has no consideration for transness, trans identity, and their experiences – this is evident in the way it misrepresents the trans character in several moments. This is a film whose chaos lacks any kind of cohesion, where Memo seems to break the rules of tone and action and create a musical with a song on vaginoplasty. The ridiculousness of this film cannot be mistaken for originality, this musical mess doesn’t have an iota of heart.
Emilia Pérez is available to watch on Mubi.
