Emilia Pérez  - Review

Rating: 4 out of 5

JACQUES Audiard’s Emilia Pérez is, by turns, audacious, thought-provoking and brilliant.

It starts life as a cartel-driven crime drama and musical, before transforming into a transgender drama that also encapsulates humanitarian issues.

It packs a violent punch but can also be quite intimate, inspirational and insightful, exploring the human condition in often revealing and sometimes provocative fashion, yet emerging as both empowering and tragic at the same time.

The story follows Mexican crime boss Juan ‘Manitas’ Del Monte (played by Spanish trans actor Karla Sofía Gascón) as he seeks to transition from man to woman, enlisting the help of disillusioned lawyer Rita (Zoe Saldana) to do so.

Given the precarious circumstances of his life (and the violence therein) Manitas’ plan must remain top secret, even to his wife Jessi (Selena Gomez) and their two kids. But they must also be protected and set up with a new life in Switzerland.

Ever resourceful, Rita achieves all that she is hired to do and four years pass before Manitas, now living as the Emilia Pérez of the title, decides that she wants to be reunited with her family…

To reveal too much more about Audiard’s screenplay would be doing the film a disservice; suffice to say that it seldom does what you expect of it, narratively. And that’s only a good thing.

Where the film scores so highly, however, is in its depiction of the complexity of life, not least from both a feminist and transgender perspective. Being true to one’s self, identity (sexual and otherwise) and desire all figure strongly as the story plays out, providing a voice to a much maligned group (the LGBTQ+ community) as well as compassion and potential understanding.

Framing a gender swap storyline within a crime drama adds to the provocative nature of the storytelling but also heightens the moral complexity at play in the way that it addresses toxic masculinity and heightens the stakes surrounding Emilia’s predicament.

In Manitas guise, Emilia is informed by her surroundings - a man born into violence who has always longed to be a woman. In revealing this yearning to Rita, the film taps into the psychology at play when it comes to gender identity - the fear, the longing, the peril.

Once she becomes Emilia, there is liberation. And Audiard allows the film to blossom in unexpected ways, as Emilia, free of the shackles of the cartel, seeks to address a Mexican tragedy: the disappearing of more than 100,000 Mexicans since records began in 1960. It lends the film an unexpected relevance.

But just as it seems to settle into an awareness raising human rights drama, Emilia Pérez simultaneously shifts focus into family melodrama, as its central character attempts to have it all: romance, family, purpose… only to find that Jessi has her own wants and desires, which invariably invites anger and tragedy.

Audiard’s film is undoubtedly a complex piece, which displays almost limitless ambition. For there’s also the musical element that lends proceedings a fantastical quality whenever the songs begin.

And, admittedly, this is the least successful component, with the songs, in particular, struggling to stand out musically - even though they’re used to deliver both exposition and internalised thinking.

Audiard also opens himself up to criticism for tackling a subject he has no personal connection with: he is a French filmmaker who hasn’t set foot in Mexico, opting to use French sound stages for a lot of the scenes. He doesn’t even employ any Mexican actors.

But while the latter criticism is certainly valid, it doesn’t detract from the overall power of the film, which is a stunning achievement.

Despite the violent backdrop, there is so much heart on display that Emilia Pérez feels as empowering as it is enlightened in attitude. It isn’t afraid to confront difficult, yet very current issues - but does so with an intelligence and sensitivity that is admirable.

And this is further enhanced by the performances, which to a person, are brilliant. Gascón is particularly memorable as Pérez - by turns intimidating, liberated, heartbroken and loving. It is a pitch perfect performance that will surely resonate with the community it represents.

But Saldaña is on blistering form, too, her gutsy lawyer a formidable feminist force in a male dominated world. She wears her contempt for that world for all to see early on, which makes her own transformative journey just as emboldening.

And Gomez is also terrific as Perez’s wife - a firecracker in so many ways, yet whose own life is informed by deceit, tragedy and suppressed desire.

Emilia Pérez surely won’t be to everyone’s taste given the subjects it confronts and the communities it represents. But for those who take the journey, it offers rich rewards. It is a tour-de-force that bristles with an electrifying energy.