“Emilia Pérez” has been called many things: offensive, tasteless, a regressive and stereotypical portrayal of the trans experience, heinous, the list of negative adjectives goes on. Despite this, the film is critically acclaimed and has recieved numerous accolades at Cannes Film Festival, the Golden Globes and the Critics Choice Awards, and multiple award nominations. The film is up for 11 British Academy Film Awards and three Screen Actors Guild awards. Most impressive of all is the truly baffling 13 Oscar nominations it has received, putting “Emilia Pérez” only one nomination away from joining “All About Eve,” “Titanic,” and “La La Land” as the most nominated films in Oscars history. 

However in an Oscars race rife with controversy, “Emilia Pérez” is certainly the most contentious film thanks to comments made by director Jacques Audiard and the recently resurfaced offensive posts on X of lead actress Karla Sofía Gascón. Gascón’s posts have certainly garnered the most negative attention, so much so that, since their discovery, her awards campaign has dropped off the edge into freefall — hopefully dragging the rest of “Emilia Pérez” down with her as well. The posts are mainly from 2020 to 2021, and while I am not going to repeat any of what Gascón said here, the most succinct way to describe them is that for every minority group you can think of, there exists a truly hateful Gascón post about them. It is genuinely impressive the sheer amount of malice she holds for basically every ethnic group on the planet. Her hate did not just stop at minority groups, however. Gascón went after individuals as well, body-shaming Adele and ridiculing Selena Gomez, her now castmate. Thus, Gascón’s previous good press about being the first openly trans actor to be nominated for an Academy Award quickly dissipated. 

Though Gascón has since deleted her X account and apologized numerous times, it appears the damage has already been done. Netflix has announced they will no longer be paying for any flights, accommodations or styling for Gascón through the rest of the awards season. Audiard has publicly said he is no longer speaking with her, which feels an awful lot like throwing her under the bus, especially considering what he’s had to say about the film’s subject. This declaration seemingly falls perfectly in line with the indifferent attitude he has displayed in response to valid criticism of “Emilia Pérez” throughout this awards season. Despite “Emilia Pérez” being set in Mexico, the entire film was shot in France, primarily in a studio. When asked about this choice Audiard, also French, said that they did location scouting but ultimately the images he had in mind for the film “weren’t going to fit on the streets of Mexico.” Addressing criticism about the inauthenticity of the film, Audiard rebutted, “it might be a little pretentious of me, but did Shakespeare need to go all the way to Verona to write a story about that place?” He even admitted to not researching Mexico in preparation for making the film. He also called the film’s primary language, Spanish, which he does not speak, “a language of modest countries, of developing countries, of the poor and migrants.” Of the entire world it is estimated about 7.5% or 600 million people speak Spanish, and 500 million use it as their first language. Somehow, Audiard’s insensitive statements garnered far less mainstream press than the discovery of Gascón’s posts; however, they should not be overlooked. Personally, I believe Audiard’s repetitive, problematic and belittling statements about the cultural subject of his film should have been enough to place “Emilia Pérez” under serious scrutiny, but, evidently, we can’t all think like me. 

Finally, of the four main actresses in the film, only one is Mexican — Adriana Paz — and she is notably not up for any of the awards “Emilia Pérez” is lauded with. When asked about their casting choices, casting director Carla Hool said they had a ‘big search’ throughout Mexico, the United States and South America as whole, and despite being committed to ‘authenticity,’ they thought the cast they settled on was the best option for the roles.

Gascón is Spanish, Zoe Saldaña is of Dominican and Puerto-Rican descent and Selena Gomez is of Mexican American descent. With the exception of Gascón who plays the titular character, the character’s backstories were modified to fit their origins. Rita Mora Castro, Saldaña’s character was supposed to be Mexican but the film now explains that Rita’s family migrated to the Dominican Republic when she was young. Gomez’s character, Jessi, has a blink and you miss it throwaway line explaining she was born in the United States but moved to Mexico as a teen. It appears that despite commitment to ‘authenticity’ there was little issue in rewriting characters who previously had Mexican origins. Both Gascón and Gomez have had their Mexican accents criticized, but Gomez most especially. Mexican actor Eugenio Derbez called Gomez’s acting “indefensible” though he later apologized for the statement. Others have elaborated saying that her body language and tone do not match the words she is speaking. Gomez has become the source of many jokes online including a popular one that compares her Spanish line delivery to that of Emilia Clarke speaking High Valyrian in “Game of Thrones.” 

The cast’s origins came under scrutiny because the film heavily revolves around the history of drug trafficking and cartel violence within Mexico. This contextual aspect of the film is another source of heavy criticism, especially in Mexico where “Emilia Pérez” was much more poorly received. Screenwriter Héctor Guillén found issue with the movie’s levity, his comments amounted to finding an operatic musical to be the wrong vessel for discussing “a drug war, [with] 500,000 deaths [since 2006] and 100,000 missing in the country.” Notably, neither Mexico nor the very real victims of violence the movie portrays, have been significantly mentioned in any of the acceptance speeches of those who worked on “Emilia Pérez.” Criticism further extends to the film’s portrayal of transitioning and the trans experience. The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation called “Emilia Pérez” a “step backwards for trans representation” and a “profoundly retrograde portrayal of a trans woman” due to its “recyl[ing] the trans stereotypes, tropes and clichés of the not-so-distant past.” 

But surely, one might think, despite all of this mess, 13 Oscar nominations is a big deal! The film must be brilliant or have some other redeeming quality! No. The film is also terrible. Even one Oscar nomination would have been too much for “Emilia Pérez.” I am fully serious when I say “Emilia Pérez” might genuinely be the worst film I have seen in the past year and I saw “Madame Web,” “Argylle” and “Irish Wish.” Now, is “Emilia Pérez” one of the worst movies ever made? Certainly not. However, I also did not leave the theater angry after “Madame Web” because I had just wasted precious hours of my life. I do feel that way about “Emilia Pérez.” I need the Academy to answer for the two hours and 12 minutes of my life I spent watching “Emilia Pérez” that I am never going to get back. 

For those unfamiliar, “Emilia Pérez” follows a cartel leader who hires down-on-her-luck lawyer, Rita Mora Castro, to fulfill a lifelong dream of transitioning. In order to do so, Emilia Pérez fakes her death and sends her wife, Jessi, and their two sons away to live in Switzerland so that she may begin her new life post-transition — positioning transitioning as dying is one of those outdated regressive trans tropes GLAAD was talking about. Eventually, Emilia claims she was the sister of Jessi’s now late husband and brings Jessi and the kids back to Mexico as she misses them. Reunited with her family, the bored and wealthy Emilia feels she is living a purposeless life. On a whim she decides to found “La Lucecita,” a non-profit organization focused on finding the corpses of victims of drug-related violence and reuniting them with their loved ones. She brings Rita on as her partner in this endeavor. To be perfectly clear, much of the money Emilia uses to fund La Lucecita comes from the profits she made off the drug wars that were responsible for the deaths of the very victims whose bodies she is helping recover. She also uses her former connections in the criminal world of the cartels to help speed along the process of discovering the locations of the mass graves. 

Before anyone gets ahead of themselves, Emilia does not create La Lucecita as a means of redemption or a way to offset the severe and prolific violence in her past. She’s doing it because she needs a hobby. In fact, the film positions her as no longer being responsible for her actions pre-transition because transition has literally made her a different person. Through transition she was entirely absolved of her sins and therefore divorced from any moral consequences from her time as an extremely successful cartel leader. Early in the film Rita has a line where she says “Changing the body, changes society. Changing society changes the soul. Changing the soul changes society, changing society changes it all!” At the time, I thought to myself that’s a strange thing to say! Little did I know it was to essentially become the film’s thesis.

I am not sure what kind of take on the transgender experience I expected from a film whose titular character flashes Rita to prove she’s on estrogen but I guess it wasn’t that. The flashing incident occurs ten minutes into the film and Rita spends the following 15 minutes consistently misgendering Emilia. I mention the timing only because despite the problematic aspects, the first 30 minutes are the only remotely entertaining moments in the film. The first 30 minutes of “Emilia Pérez” are a mystifying and surreal experience during which you cannot possibly fathom what is going to happen next. By minute 31 you spend the rest of the film wondering when it’s going to finally be over. I promise you nothing interesting or new happens after minute thirty-one, except for the explosive ending, which was honestly kind of predictable so even that wasn’t vastly enjoyable. 

Visually, “Emilia Pérez” struggles to choose between a gritty dull thriller look and its bright, flashy, heavily choreographed and cut dance sequences. “Emilia Pérez’s” two different worlds, reality and musical, are in constant conflict with one another, creating a disjointing viewing experience. “Todo y Nada” and “El Mal,” the Oscar nominee for Best Original Song, both sung by Zoe Saldaña struck me as particularly jarring moments as the songs’ cutting and choreography clash so heavily with the visuals and story moments occurring on screen just before the songs began. “Emilia Pérez” made a myriad of aesthetic choices that failed to stick to a consistent theme resulting in numerous inelegant moments — one such being the cheesy split-screen phone call moment during “El Trio.” A clip of “El Trio” went viral where it was heavily criticized due to “Emilia Pérez” receiving a nomination for best film editing. Anyone describing “Emilia Pérez” as audacious is correct. However a film possessing a bold new take does not automatically make it good. 

Furthermore, “Emilia Pérez” failed to convince me it needed to be a musical. Although the songs felt intentional in the beginning, their relevance quickly dissipated. Even the characters seem confused by having to sing, as a lot of the ‘singing’ is really more ‘speak-singing’ to an ambiguous rhythm. The whispering to a beat that occurs in some of the songs, such as “El Encuentro,” should hardly count as musicality due to its poor execution. This version of singing also added very little to the plot or style of the film. Rita speak-sings a duet with a doctor in Tel Aviv, called “Lady,” where bizarrely she tries to convince him to do a gender-affirming on Emilia Pérez, even though his entire job is to perform such surgeries. The song very easily could have been a conversation; it probably would have made more sense that way. However, I found this moment in the film to be the most ridiculous, so I will say that, in a soundtrack that lacks a single good song, it is my favorite. I would describe “Emilia Pérez” as a classic case of “you can’t have your cake and eat it too.” It needed to commit to either the story it was attempting to tell or the dramatic opera it envisioned its song sequences as emulating.

I would be remiss if I did not mention “La Vaginoplastia” after the first minute of the song went viral due to the infamous ‘from penis to vagina’ line. Rita is visiting Bangkok researching the best gender affirming surgeons and the doctor explains to her all of the surgeries they have available. This song also occurs within the first 20 minutes of the film and it is just as ludicrous as the clip implies it to be. If you were feeling persuaded to watch “Emilia Pérez” due to the absurdity exhibited in the “La Vaginoplastia” clip, don’t. It is the only song that exhibits such campy and fun energy. If all the songs were like that, I argue the film would have been vastly more enjoyable. 

The single redeeming quality of “Emilia Pérez” is Zoe Saldaña’s performance. She was acting like her life was on the line and she has a really amazing voice to boot. Her character’s reactions to the almost unbelievable world she finds herself a part of are sometimes amusing. Her presence is so fundamental to the film, I believe she should be the one campaigning for best leading actress instead of Karla Sofía Gascón. But alas awards season category fraud is the least of “Emilia Pérez’s” problems. Unfortunately Saldaña’s presence is not enough to offset every other aspect of the film and is certainly not justification for the accolades “Emilia Pérez” has thus far received. 

This all begs the question: if “Emilia Pérez” is so terrible, why is it receiving so much awards recognition? Why is it receiving thirteen Oscar nominations in particular? This year’s Oscar nominations were perceived as snubbing several deserving films such as “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” “Longlegs,” “Challengers” and “I Saw The TV Glow.” “Emilia Pérez’s” numerous nominations over other films left many confused. In response to Luca Guadagnino receiving zero Oscar recognition for either of his critically acclaimed 2024 films, “Challengers” and “Queer,” one individual on X asked, “did luca guadagnino kill somebody?” A sentiment I have to agree with because, at this point, I honestly have no other reasonable explanation as to why Guadagnino has yet to receive Oscar recognition as a director. 

Unfortunately, there is one simple reason for “Emilia Pérez’s” success, it is exactly the sort of faux-progressive film the Academy loves to nominate and then pat themselves on the back for. It is no secret that we are rapidly swinging backwards into an increasingly conservative culture. Our current sitting president has made trans people and Hispanic people, but especially Mexicans, the target of much of his vitriol. The rhetoric he and members of his party continue to apply to both minority groups remains increasingly alarming. “Emilia Pérez” feels like a senseless way for the Academy to declare that is not what they stand for. If this is truly the motivation for the Academy’s recognition of “Emilia Pérez” it is a disappointing but not surprising one. If the Academy wanted a film about the trans experience they could have just as easily picked “I Saw The TV Glow,” which received praise for its use of a trans allegory and was made by Jane Schoenbrun, a trans nonbinary filmmaker. Martin Scorsese called the film, “emotionally and psychologically and very moving.” If the Academy was truly searching for a way to uplift Mexican culture, they surely could have chosen better than a film hellbent on sentimentalizing and trivializing the pain caused by cartels and cartel drug wars in Mexico — especially not a film whose director has made such dismissive comments about the very country and culture he was portraying. “Emilia Pérez” and its controversy can be likened to past Best Picture winners “Green Book” in 2019 and “CODA” in 2022. Both films also sparked heavy debate regarding their representation of minority groups but still managed to win despite pushback. Some may say this is a good omen for “Emilia Pérez’s” chances to win at the 97th Academy Awards. I would rather we wait and see if the recent controversy surrounding Karla Sofía Gascón impacts results at the BAFTAs and SAG awards, which are often seen as indicators of which films will go on to win Oscars. The voting windows for both the BAFTAs and the SAG awards had yet to close when Gascón’s posts were discovered, unlike the Critics Choice Awards whose voting window closed prior. We can only hope that the Academy chooses to stop celebrating such blatant prejudice and poor filmmaking, but they’re the Academy so I won’t hold my breath. You can be certain of one thing if “Emilia Pérez” wins a single Academy Award, I will have wasted seven dollars paying an Etsy witch to hex the cast and crew. 

If there is any justice in the world “Emilia Pérez” won’t win a single award at the Oscars. Between the film’s wretched execution and the beliefs of certain members of cast and crew, it is my opinion that it doesn’t even deserve its nominations. Still, I will be the first to admit that very rarely have I walked away from a livestream of the Academy Awards believing every win was deserved. However, in my humble opinion below is who I would have nominated for every category in place of “Emilia Pérez.” 

1. Actress in a Leading Role: Zendaya, “Challengers.”

2. Actress in a Supporting Role: Margaret Qualley, “The Substance.”

3. Cinematography: Stéphanie Fontaine, “Conclave.”  

4. Directing: Luca Guadagnino, “Challengers.” 

5. Film Editing: Marco Costa, “Challengers.”

6. International Feature Film: India, “All We Imagine as Light.” 

7. Makeup and Hairstyling: Eva Von Bahr and Love Larson, “Dune: Part Two.” 

8. Music (Original Score): Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, “Challengers.”

9. Music (Original Song): “Compress / Repress” by Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor, “Challengers.”

10. Music (Original Song): “Forbidden Road” by Robbie Williams, “Better Man.”

11. Sound: James Harrison, “Blitz.”

12. Writing (Adapted Screenplay): “The Room Next Door,” Pedro Almodóvar. 

13. Finally, in the spirit of Academy collaboration, I polled all of my film buff friends and here is the list of films they would have nominated for Best Picture instead of “Emilia Pérez”: “Sing Sing,” “Better Man,” “Longlegs,” “Challengers,” “Nosferatu,” “I Saw The TV Glow” and “Didi.”