In the history of the Academy Awards, three films are currently tied for the most number of nominations. That would be "All About Eve," "Titanic," and "La La Land," all of which were nominated 14 times. Nearly joining that exclusive club this year was "Emilia Pérez," which just missed the record with thirteen nods. That would imply a film that is universally loved. Which "Emilia Pérez" is... Among industry insiders, the people who make up the Academy's voting body. Reception among professional critics has been more divided, the film currently sitting at 75% on Rotten Tomatoes after getting a standing ovation at Cannes, for whatever that is worth. Within the wider cinephile community, Jacques Audiard's musical has quickly become aggressively despised. Members of the LGBT+ community have decried it as insensitive. People in Mexico have roundly mocked and booed it. Film Twitter has unleashed a tidal wave of venom against the movie, the likes of which we only see, oh, every two weeks or so. Nevertheless, the question of whether "Emilia Pérez" is a masterpiece or offensive schlock remains in the air. Obviously only I – some random dork on the internet – can answer this.
Rita is a lawyer working in Mexico City, quickly becoming disillusioned with her job. This is when she accepts a mysterious offer that results in her getting kidnapped and shoved into the back of a van. She arrives at the compound of cartel kingpin Juan "Manitas" Del Monte. Manitas confesses to Rita that he wishes to transition genders and start a new life over in another part of the world, while his wife Jessi and their children remain safe. Rita organizes the procedure and legal affairs, telling Jessi that her husband has been murdered. Four years later, Rita encounters Emilia Pérez, the drug lord's new identity. Desiring to see her children, Emilia poses as Manitas' sister and moves in with Jessi and the kids. Upon seeing the lives destroyed by the drug business she used to run, Emilia and Rita create an organization designed to find the missing bodies of the cartel's victims. However, tensions soon flair, especially once Jenni begins seeing an old boyfriend. Rita and Emilia are soon drawn into a violent confrontation.
The most damning negative press surrounding "Emelia Pérez" has come from actual trans and queer people. Hollywood has often fumbled the treatment of trans individuals, usually centering a cis person in the story or turning them into psychos or punchlines. As a cis dude, I certainly can't reflect on "Emilia Pérez" through a trans perspective. That doesn't mean I can't see how obviously tasteless the movie is. The first thing Emilia Pérez does after transitioning is look at her groin with a mirror. This follows a campy musical number, in which trans people on gurneys dance around a clinic while the details of the procedure are sung. In general, the film seems distressingly fixated on people's genitalia, with Selena Gomez dramatically describing her lover's penis and, during a different musical number, Zoë Saldana caresses her groin with a lock of woman's hair. The film seems to think identity extends only to physical appearance and what's between a person's legs, treating trans individuals as grotesque points of spectacle. It's the kind of baffling miscalculation that leaves your jaw dropped in disbelief.
Not that "Emilia Pérez" is actually about being trans. The title character gets one tearful song describing their life and gender dysphoria in vague terms. Otherwise, we only ever see Pérez through the perspective of cis people. After the belabored first act and Pérez reinvents herself, the character's transness becomes nothing but a plot contrivance. The film has nothing to say about what a trans woman's life is actually like. All of the movie is like that, bringing up weighty real world topics without addressing them in any meaningful way.
"Emilia Pérez" is as much a movie about cartel violence in Mexico as it is about being trans, which is to say that it never discusses the social conditions and international pressures that bring this horribly violent business to life. The grieving families being brought some closure takes up one song and that's it. The political corruption of Mexico's government is the subject of a single song but never discussed among the characters themselves nor brought up again. Does this mean "Emilia Pérez" is a movie about redemption and transformation, the title character seeking to right what wrongs were committed in the past? Not really, as Emilia is treated as a saintly figure who only wants to help the world after transitioning. There's a startling disconnect between how the film portrays cartel violence as a sickening evil but never persecutes the person behind so much of it. Similarly, in the first scene, Rita is writing a speech to get an obviously guilty murderer off, the moral implications of that never being considered again. So much of "Emilia Pérez" is like that, never considering the deeper meaning of any of the weighty topics it weaves into the story.
For another example: In the latter half of the film, Emilia begins a romantic affair with the wife of one of the cartel's victims. This subplot is shockingly inessential, contributing to the story in no way. Meanwhile, Jenni's old boyfriend is never properly introduced nor fleshed out, despite indirectly pushing the movie towards its violent climax. That story thread also involves Pérez becoming possessive of her former wife and children, the sole time the movie acknowledges the blood-filled past. If "Emilia Pérez" was a movie about how one person can be many different things – ruthless crime boss, loving father, saintly woman, obsessive spouse, activist – than maybe these contradictions would have a deeper implication. However, the script is far too shallow for any of that to be possible. Throughout the entire runtime, we never learn much about Emilia's interior life or background. We learn less about Rita, who is pushed about by the plot's whims without being defined much. Jessi is another thinly sketched idea, to propel the soap opera-like narrative towards as lurid a conclusion as possible. That the movie has nothing meaningful to say about being trans or crime in Mexico should come as no surprise, as it has nothing much to say about anything that happens in it.
With such little substance to its story and so little interest in exploring the serious topics it brings up, one is forced to consider "Emilia Pérez" as a stylistic exercise alone. Director Jacques Audiard previously made critically acclaimed motion pictures like "A Prophet" and "Rust and Bone." That certainly implies that he knows what he's doing. One can assume that cinematographer Paul Guilhaume does too. This must mean that "Emilia Pérez" looks this fucking ugly on purpose. So much of the film is shot through a murky lens, bathing half of the frame in dim shadows nearly every second. Many scenes are comprised of half-lit close-ups on faces as people have conversations in cramped rooms. Interiors are lit in sickly greens or washed-out reds. The blurry visuals of the movie pair poorly with extravagant stylish choices. One music number has Selena Gomez stimping into a darkened area under a spotlight, with other dancers. Another sequence has the faces of everyone Pérez has harmed and helped appearing on scene, which goes on and on to the point of becoming comical. The flashiest song has the camera crash-zooming on Saldana as she's does jagged dances moves. The result is a visually assaulting motion picture that connects extremely glum earthiness with obnoxiously showy creative choices, insuring that the audience is never getting any aesthetic value out of anything they are looking at.
The film is based on an opera libretto Audiard previously wrote, based on the novel "Écoute" by Boris Razon. An operatic approach would certainly explain why the film is full of so many tawdry and unlikely plot developments and self-consciously outrageous events. One would also assume this means Audiard has an interest in the musical format. Once again, begging the question of why most of the songs in "Emilia Pérez" are so instantly forgettable, when they aren't outright laughable. The "sex change" operation number has been widely mocked online but is a good example of how tin-earred much of the singing is. A lot of the lyrics are composed of talked dialogue, constantly feeling awkward in the actors' mouths. The mishmash of musical genres further make the film a baffling experience. Most of Selena Gomez' songs are electronic influenced pop numbers while Saldana's big nominated number, "El mal," is performed in a partly shouted rap cadence. And these are actually two of the better numbers, as they at least have memorable melodies or some pretty singing.
In the musical genre, the characters burst into song and dance as expressions of feelings they can't say in regular words. A movie wherein none of the characters have interior lives mean the songs feel like an exercise in of themselves. This is, it seems, "Emilia Perez's" entire modus operandi. It demands attention, with its flashy camera movements, a script that tosses in controversial topics, a melodramatic plot structure, and a suffocating sense of self-importance. The performances, Saldana – who is clearly the lead, despite being nominated in the supporting category – and Gomez especially, mug in hammy manners. Karla Sofía Gascón at least has some serenity in the title role but there's simply nothing actually there for a performer to latch onto. "Emilia Pérez" is a movie that insists on its own seriousness despite having so little to actually say, existing simply as a self-aggrandizing exercise in what can – and not what should – be done cinematically. It is an ugly film, visually and figuratively, that gawks at the topics it pretends to care about in service of showing off its own declared importance. [4/10]
No comments:
Post a Comment