The influence musicals have on the film and theater industry is nothing new. Using the power of music to expand the deeper meanings and messages of the text reaches people in a multitude of ways. Musicals create a digestible spin on societal commentary that encourages real conversations to take place.
As someone who doesn’t necessarily like musicals, I can say that I’ve genuinely enjoyed the commentary mixed in with the playful and artfully characterized songs in between. Of all the musicals I’ve been exposed to, none of them had as bad publicity and reviews as Emilia Perez (2024).
I’ve seen an almost humiliating lack of support and love for Jacques Audiard’s newest exploration, and I have to question: How did it receive 23 nominations between the Golden Globes and Oscars?
When comparing Emilia Perez to its musical counterpart, Wicked, it statistically doesn’t make sense how this stereotypical mock-opera received more critically acclaimed recognition.
Ignoring the 30 years Wicked has on Emilia Perez, its commentary exploits political greed and racism through a fantastical world of witches, munchkins, and talking animals. Its music is hard not to move to and the choreography creates expression detailed perfectly to its respective characters.
Emilia Perez explores an oppressive and suffocating environment for a closeted transgender woman who wishes to leave her business behind and enjoy life as she intends to. It’s good in theory, and could have even been a coming of age film that shows you’re never too old to discover who you really are.
The environment surrounding the film is where people took offense. In the film, Emilia runs the cartel in Mexico. According to the Council of Foreign Relations the drug war has killed almost 500,000 people since 2006. Again, I don’t think it’s the worst idea and if approached in a different light, could’ve had a serious impact.
Unfortunately, the film came off as “Racist Eurocentric Mockery,” according to Héctor Guillén, a Mexican screenwriter who has been very vocal on the ignorance of this film. Gullién makes an excellent point of referring to the film as “Eurocentric” as its director and writer is a Cisgendered Frenchman playing on struggles he is far removed from, which shows in the construction of this musical.
Jacques Audiard is a critically acclaimed French director and screenwriter for Emilia Perez. However, I have to say the way he handled this project seems amateur and irresponsible considering the commentary at hand.
When the people who reflect the identity of his project showed disdain and disgust at the blind eye turned towards the serious issues within the cartel, he “apologizes” by dismissing his shortcoming saying, “I’m not even trying to offer answers– cinema doesn’t provide answers, it only raises questions.”
Guillén makes great points in a BBC article ,saying, “You are taking one of the most difficult topics in the country, but not only any film, it’s an opera. It’s a musical.”
He continues by exposing how one of the main plot points exploits a vulnerable and sensitive majority of their society, “Part of the plot is about searching mothers of the disappeared [searching for their children]. And there were zero words in the four Golden Globe acceptance speeches to the victims.”
To capitalize on a suffering community for your own monetary and entertainment purposes is one thing, but to not even recognize the turmoil and trauma those groups experience is a whole different level of greed and ignorance.
Audiard continues to dig himself into this hole of ignorance, “the film was an ‘opera’ and therefore not ‘realistic’,” he said in an interview with CNN, furthering to distance himself from taking any accountability in the controversy and dismissing the concerns of the community he just made a film depicting.
Audiard and his cast are not the only ones to blame in this situation. Somehow, this Netflix flop has been nominated for 23 awards, of which it has won two.
I’d like to take this moment to bring back its competitor, Wicked, as it was the only other pure musical released last year. With a $717.9 million worldwide box office release, and a cast full of passionate theater kids, some who dreamt of this role since childhood, it should have been a clean sweep against its infamous competitor.
Critics apparently think otherwise as Emilia Perez bested Wicked in the Best Motion Picture and Best Supporting Actress category.
Because Emilia Perez wasn’t released in the box office, box office comparisons are unavailable. However, a scale that many tend to look to is Rotten Tomatoes, owned and operated by Warner Bros. The setup of the scale are percentages of critics responses (Tomatometer) and audience responses (Popcornmeter). Wicked has a Tomatometer percentage of 88% and Popcornmeter of 95%. Emilia Perez has a Tomatometer of 73% and Popcornmeter of 18%. Considering that the audience score couldn’t even break one-fourth of Wicked’s audience score should tell you that the 73% critic choice is pure pity.
To further the contrast in quality between these two productions, the top five critic responses for Emilia Perez still feature people showing dislike for the movie. “Rather than enhancing the film’s narratives, the music functions as a loud gimmicky distraction from storytelling that can’t be bothered to do even the most basic work of connecting its audience to its settings and characters,” said Jack Hamiliton, a pop critic and associate professor of American Media Studies.
“It’s cheesy and loopy and fun to watch but I think the Oscar buzz is a bit over the top,” said Stephen Romei, another critic who actually liked the film.
I doubt I’ll be able to fully invest myself in this movie without thinking of the press surrounding it. It’s important to form your own opinions, but I feel like when the community that makes up the movie doesn’t even recognize this as a good representation or exposé of active conflict; why would I waste my time?
Every clip I saw on “Emilia Perez” seemed like surface level commentary trying to incorporate traumatic life experiences with beatless, shallow musical breaks. On top of that, I don’t think every movie or musical needs to have deep societal commentary and can just be entertaining and fun, but what aspect of this radiates entertaining or fun?
I think there may be a universe where Emilia Perez comes from a more genuine and expressive place in the heart of someone who feels a deeper connection with the material but, I regret to inform, it is not this universe.
