Emilia Perez movie review

MOVIE TITLE: Emilia Perez

This crime/musical/drama/Trans movie is now playing on Netflix and won “Best Picture” at the Golden Globes. We’ll see if it also earns an Academy Awards. My question is WHY has it been nominated at all when so many people hate this movie?

There were so many better movies in 2024 that should have been nominated!

RATING: R

LENGTH: 2 hours 12 minutes

Movie Review Mom GRADE: C

IN A NUTSHELL:

Jacques Audiard wrote, directed, and produced this ambitious, messy, and controversial film. He said he was inspired to write this musical by the 2018 novel “Ecoute’” by Boris Razon. “Ecoute” means “listen” in French, which is a word and theme used in the film over and over.

I was an exchange student in Mexico way back when I was in high school, so I was curious how this movie was going to portray the country and its people.

The story is about a Mexican attorney who gets wrapped up in the drama of a drug lord who wants to change his gender to a woman.

TIPS FOR PARENTS:

This movie is not appropriate for children.
We see bloody images of a murder scene
Everything is spoken in Spanish, so we have to read subtitles.
Talk of suicide
Drug Trafficking
Some violence
Profanity and F-bombs
Various weapons are used.
We see dead bodies.

THEMES:

Happiness
Restitution
Forgiveness
Family
Desire
Second chances
Mexico’s drug trafficking catastrophe

THINGS I LIKED:

Zoe Saldana shows us more what she can do which includes singing and dancing.
Selena Gomez provides the singing chops. She admitted she wasn’t happy with her Spanish abilities in the film, switching back and forth between English and Spanish. I thought her songs would be the best, but they’re disappointing.
Karla Sofia Gascon is the first Trans actor/actress to win an award at the Cannes Film Festival.
The rest of the cast includes Edgar Ramirez, Adriana Paz, Mark Ivanir.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:

We’re supposed to praise a drug lord who decides to have surgery to become a Trans woman? This is the hero of the movie? Really?
Both Mexicans and the Trans communities have expressed deep disappointment and offense over how their people are portrayed in the movie. The word “disrespectful” has been tossed around quite a bit.
I was surprised at how many errors there were in Spanish. What? Supposedly, the script was written in French and then translated into Spanish…by AI? The director admitted he didn’t really spend any time studying Mexico in order to ensure the culture, language, and trafficking issues were portrayed correctly. Later, he offered a half-hearted apology by saying, “Cinema doesn’t provide answers; it only asks questions. But maybe the questions in Emilia Perez are incorrect.”
Even though the story is supposed to take place in Mexico, the entire movie was filmed in a studio in France!
Zoe Saldana’s accent in Spanish switches from American, Colombian, Puerto Rican and Dominican, but her character is supposed to be Mexican. What?
The AI voice software “Respeecher” was used in the film to make Karla Sofia Gascon’s voice sound deeper when he/she sings as a man.
The only Mexican in a big role is Adriana Paz. Mexicans have complained that she was given only 11 minutes of screentime, wasn’t on the movie poster, didn’t walk the red carpet at the Golden Globes, and didn’t get to sit next to her co-stars at the ceremony.
The song “Vos Ya Sabes” has been rumored to be a rip-off of an Argentine pop song from 2011.
Mexico is #3 in gender-reassignment surgeries in the world, but the movie shows Emilia going all the way to Israel to have her surgery there.
These lyrics and choreography are not going to be all the rage on TikTok like they still are with Wicked Part 1.
The length of the film is self-indulgent and unnecessary.
The night scenes are super dark, making it difficult to see what’s going on, especially if you watch this on a small screen.
The film is simply trying to cover too much material.

INTERESTING LINES:

“To listen is to accept.” – Rita (Zoe Saldana)
“Do you want to change your life or change your sex?” – Rita (Zoe Saldana) “What is the difference?” – Manitas (Karla Sofia Gascon)

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