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Emilia Perez Movie Review

Emilia Perez is a 2024 musical crime film directed by Jacques Audiard and starring Zoe Saldana, Karla Sofia Gascon and Selena Gomez. It’s a very interesting, but messy movie.

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“You never thought about running off together?“

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Cartel leader Emilia enlists Rita, an unappreciated lawyer, to help fake her death so that she can finally live authentically as her true self. I’d expected a lot going into this movie given its strong Oscar buzz and a great run at festivals, but I have to say that I was somewhat disappointed by the eventual results. It’s a positively unique movie for sure, but one that was problematic in more areas than one.

It is easy to see why this film is so renowned by critics and festival attendees and why it got mixed audience reception. The former group obviously fell in love with its trans and female-centric storyline and an authentic hybrid genre while the latter audience found flaws in the execution of said genres and the depictions of its characters. This is a very anti-PC movie, which I did appreciate to a degree as it lent a sort of manic, unpredictable quality to the whole experience, but it did leave me wondering how such an obviously problematic depiction of a trans character went so well with movie critics.

Let’s talk about the title character. I found Emilia to be an underdeveloped character, one that was very interesting and memorable, but one that also needed to have been fleshed out more. A more confident and better fit for a director of this story would have obviously been Almodovar, who has always excelled at developing both gay and trans stories. There is so much that this director got wrong while depicting transitioning (especially what hormones do to your body), but there is so much intrigue in this character’s journey and the actress elevated the role significantly with a very strong turn. Karla Sofia Gascon was commanding in her presence and uniquely mysterious as well. She was excellent.

Other actresses did a great job too in this film that clearly favored women with the men all being quite forgettable and uninteresting. Clearly Selena Gomez doesn’t speak Spanish fluently, but regardless her performance was very strong. Some found her acting to be weak, but I disagree as I found her to be an underrated actress and her work here was very good. Jessi was an unlikable character for sure, but undeniably an interesting one.

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But of the three actresses it was Zoe Saldana that stole the show for me. This is an actress who starred in some of the highest-grossing franchises in the world, but finally she got a more serious role where she didn’t get to be blue (‘Avatar’) or green (‘Guardians of the Galaxy’). Rita is a wonderful character and the only likable one of the bunch. Saldana was quite charismatic and believable in the role and I am glad that she is getting so much attention for her lovely work here.

Emilia Perez was such a wild swing from Jacque Audiard that I have to respect his vision and his ambition no matter how flawed the ultimate results are. This is one of the most entertaining and stylish movies of the year. The editing is particularly effective and I appreciated the very brisk pace and kinetic energy on display, which led to a somewhat rushed, but highly engaging narrative. The film also jumped places constantly, which made it consistently intriguing, though I did find those locations underutilized as the entirety of the film was shot in the dark. The cinematography was its weakest aspect while the directing, editing and acting were the strongest.

Let’s talk about the music. Most argued that the songs were terrible, but I found them to be quite fun and catchy, most of the songs at least. Some numbers were a bit too short, but their length led to them not overstaying their welcome, which I certainly appreciated. These are not great numbers, but they aren’t bad either. My issue doesn’t lie with the music per say, but how these numbers were shot. I am talking about the choreography and overall aesthetic accompanying the numbers. Characters would suddenly find themselves in dark rooms with dancers surrounding them when they would burst into a song. This made for a music video feel to the project that should have felt like a full-blown musical film instead.

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The plot is very engaging and fun, but also lacking in depth. The characters were intriguing, but it was also very difficult to empathize with the titular character. The film trying to paint her in a positive light and present this redemption arc for a true criminal felt very wrong to me on multiple levels and also odd considering that this was supposed to be a positive trans story. I loved the explosive ending, though. It was a fitting end to these characters. The crime and musical elements don’t mix well together at all as it’s difficult to take the plot and characters seriously when they are singing, but the originality was refreshing.