How Emilia Pérez Became a Divisive Oscar Frontrunner

Who knew that a musical would be the talk of the town going into the 2025 Oscars? No, not Wicked (though that movie has received its fair share of recognition at the box office and from the Academy) or the still puzzled-upon Robbie Williams monkey biopic Better Man, but Emilia Pérez.

The film, a French-made, Spanish-language musical about a Mexican drug cartel leader, starring Zoe Saldaña, Selena Gomez, and Karla Sofía Gascón, is a somewhat off-kilter awards chatter favorite. Sure, the Oscars love a musical (hello, La La Land) and have shown eclectic taste in the recent past (it’s only been two years since Everything Everywhere All at Once dominated the ceremony). Still, Jacques Audiard’s earnest, vivid fever dream is not standard fare. Nevertheless, Emilia Pérez’s 13 Oscar nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress for Gascón, and Best Supporting Actress for Saldaña—just one shy of the all-time record and the most nods of any movie this year—speak for themselves. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]

After premiering at the Cannes Film Festival in May and taking home the coveted Jury Prize and a joint Best Actress prize for its female ensemble (the three aforementioned performers plus Adriana Paz), discourse around Emilia Pérez lit up like a New Year’s Eve fireworks display. Praise for its handling of issues like gender confirmation surgery and Mexico’s missing persons crisis was met with equal fervor by viewers who said it mishandled those same issues. Some criticized certain performances and, well, interesting musical numbers (you’ve probably seen a clip of “La Vaginoplastia” at this point).

The worst thing an awards show can be is boring, and with the film’s somewhat unexpected dominance on Hollywood’s most competitive bill, it’s likely to be anything but. Ahead of the ceremony on March 2, here’s why Emilia Pérez is such a divisive contender.

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What Emilia Pérez is about

For his off-beat opera, Audiard (known for mostly French-language films like 2012’s Rust and Bone and 2009’s A Prophet) took loose inspiration from Boris Razon’s Écoute, in which a drug kingpin undergoes surgery to transition from male to female and disappear in the process.

Emilia Pérez transfers the action to Mexico and plants us in the criminal underbelly of the cartels. Zoe Saldaña plays Rita, a beaten-down lawyer with a moral compass that is frequently pushed aside thanks to how adept she is at getting powerful men off the hook for their crimes. After forceful persuasion (literally a blindfolded kidnapping and the promise of enough money to transform her life), she’s hired by Juan “Manitas” Del Monte, a grizzled, tattooed cartel boss who wants to transition to living as the woman she’s always known she is. Manitas needs someone—Rita—to arrange both the surgery and subsequent disappearance. Part of the plan means evacuating Manitas’ American wife (Gomez) and two children out of Mexico, to snowy Europe, while believing their patriarch has been taken out by rival drug lords.

In reality, Manitas has reintroduced herself as the titular Emilia Pérez (Karla Sofía Gascón plays both parts—the movie also earned a nod for Makeup and Hairstyling, no doubt due in part to her appearance pre-surgery). Emilia is a wealthy and glamorous woman who, after finally getting everything she wants, realizes she needs one more thing, albeit a complicated one: to be around her family. She re-hires Saldaña, who has used her cartel paycheck to set up a new moneyed life in London, to reunite her with her family in Mexico, posing as an aunt, while also trying to make amends for the violence she perpetrated in her former life by shining a light on the country’s missing persons crisis.

Interspersed between the drama, which transpires almost entirely in Spanish, are musical numbers. If you’re wondering why you haven’t actually heard any of these songs littering your TikTok FYP between riffs of “Defying Gravity,” it’s because they’re woven almost casually into the dialogue. They carry into the end of sentences as if the only way these characters who are repressed by society can let their emotions out. One song in particular, Saldaña’s “El Mal”—one of two songs from the film nominated for Best Original Song—packs the biggest punch as it aims at the hypocrisy of those upholding a violent status quo being called upon to make changes.

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How Emilia Pérez was received critically

As soon as it landed, critics were abuzz about Emilia Pérez. Awards bodies loved it. After it held its premiere at Cannes, it picked up the Jury Prize and the joint Best Actress prize, making it one of the more anticipated releases of the year. Since then, it’s steamed ahead in the awards race, with multiple Golden Globes wins, including Saldaña for Best Supporting Actress, and 10 nominations at the upcoming Oscar-precursor BAFTA awards. It began streaming on Netflix in November.

But how it’s been received by people outside of the awards bubble will really depend on who you ask, and where they are. American outlets generally reflected on it favorably; it made TIME’s 10 Best Films of 2024, with a review calling it an “ode to human possibility” that feels radical in our current political landscape. Across the board, the film has been praised for its originality in the face of a stagnant film landscape cluttered with IP and sequels, while its deft handling of subjects not usually given the musical treatment was met with appreciation.

But the verdict isn’t unanimous. The disparity between its 76% critical score on Rotten Tomatoes versus its 30% audience response paints an interesting picture, especially as the film has become an unavoidable point of derision online. It’s not the first time a film has been embraced by Hollywood but widely criticized either outside of it, or in the years to follow (think 2018’s Green Book or 2004’s Crash), though only time will tell how its own legacy will settle.

If you widen the scope to reflections outside of traditional American and European press, Emilia Pérez’s position as a radical work gets murkier.

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Why Emilia Pérez has faced criticism for trans representation

One major critique levied against certain films about the struggles of marginalized people is the emphasis on trauma. You need only to look at Oscar darlings past like 1993’s Philadelphia or 2005’s Brokeback Mountain to see how LGBTQ+ identities are consumed by awards bodies through the lens of suffering. In the few cases where trans stories have been centered, like 2015’s The Danish Girl and 2013’s Dallas Buyers Club, cis actors have been the ones applauded for their bravery in taking on marginalized roles. (Redmayne was nominated for an Oscar for the former and Jared Leto awarded for the latter).

So, for many, Emilia Pérez marks a revolutionary shift in gear. Not only is a trans woman playing a trans character but, beyond a now much-memed song about the particulars of gender confirmation surgery, Pérez’s existence as a woman isn’t litigated. No character in the film questions her identity and she is able to move through the world and even find love as a woman in her own right. The focus of the story isn’t on her transition, but the destruction left in the wake of her former life and the hubris to believe she can make amends for it. 

But Emilia Pérez positioning her transition as, at least in part, a way to avoid accountability for a life of crime has become a thorn in its side. Gascón says she approached Audiard with the question of Emilia’s motivations because, “if it’s only for escape from this world then it’s completely different than if this role or this character does this because she needs to be a woman,” adding that she believes the film does a good job of showing that the character’s trans identity is authentic. She says building out Emilia was a hugely collaborative process to ensure it was handled sensitively.

But some don’t agree that what ended up on screen tells that story. GLAAD, which pointedly did not nominate the film for anything at its annual media awards, said it recycles “trans stereotypes, tropes, and clichés” like trans women being inherently evil, the blindsided family left behind in the wake of transition, and the ugly use of misgendering as a form of othering. The organization pointed to other trans critics of the film, like Them’s Fran Tirado, who wrote, “Her transition is framed as an absolution, used as a tool for deception, and made to be the reason for her redemption and saint-like anointing at the end. It is an idea of transness so completely from the cis imagination.” The Cut’s Harron Walker details the fascination with the medical practice of transitioning as “two cis people debating the ethics of transness without any trans people present.” (Audiard is a cisgender man.)

But, speaking to the Hollywood Reporter, Gascón, who has made history as the first openly transgender actor to be nominated for Best Actress at the Oscars, responded by saying, “You must be super well-adjusted to criticize the work of 700 people from your couch, sitting there next to your PlayStation,” adding, “they claim to speak for everyone. Let me tell you: Being LGBT doesn’t make you less of an idiot.”

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Why Emilia Pérez has received criticism for Mexican representation

There’s an initial flinch many viewers may experience when a film focused on a specific cultural reality isn’t made by anyone from that culture. Historically, that combination has led to wild mischaracterizations and stereotypes. (You need only look at Hollywood’s shaky history of white directors, writers, and actors portraying Arab characters on screen to understand that skepticism.)

Emilia Pérez, directed by a French filmmaker who has admitted to having no interest in making the film “realistic” in its cultural depictions, has faced backlash for its lack of Mexican cast and crew. Clips of Selena Gomez’s performance, and specifically her accent, went viral on X and TikTok before most even had the chance to see the film. Most did not know the context, that the character is American and is meant to have a shaky grasp of the Spanish language, further adding fuel to the fire that the film was a decoupaged mess of cultural inaccuracies.

The film has picked up criticism for its allegedly shallow approach to Mexican current events and culture, and using a tragedy like cartel violence as a backdrop for a high-concept opera, especially as Audiard admitted to doing little to no research beyond his own perception of the crisis. Tragedies can be examined by those outside of its sphere of destruction, but the groundswell of feeling from Mexican viewers and critics is that there was little or no care taken to understand the cultural grief beyond stereotyped spectacle.

Adriana Paz, who plays Emilia’s love interest Epifanía in the film, is Mexican and has offered a different perspective. “I’ve heard people saying it’s offensive to Mexico. I really want to know why, because I didn’t feel that way. And I have questioned some people that I trust, not just as artists but as people, and they don’t feel that way, so I am trying to understand,” she says. 

Regardless, Audiard has apologized, saying at a press conference, “Maybe it will even seem to you that I am just flying over this issue. And if it seems to you that I am doing it too lightly, I offer you an apology.” 

The movie’s Oscar chances

With 13 nominations under its belt, it would be a tough night for Team Pérez if it left empty-handed. (Currently, the record for most losses in one night is 11, tied between 1986’s The Color Purple and 1977’s Turning Point). It’s certainly likely that Emilia Pérez will nab a little gold man or several, especially given its run so far. It’s almost certainly a shoo-in for Best International Feature Film, though Brazil’s I’m Still Here kicked into higher gear with its own surprise Best Picture nomination on Jan. 23. It also has a good chance of picking up Best Original Song, seeing as it’s occupying two of the five spots (next to “El Mal” is the Selena Gomez-sung “Mi Camino”).

Whether it takes home any of the big hitters is another question. Saldaña did win the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress, making her a strong contender, though that category has a stacked line-up with the likes of Ariana Grande’s crowd-pleasing role as Glinda in Wicked and Felicity’s Jones arc in The Brutalist, another film that could end up sweeping the ceremony.

A Best Picture upset is always a fun end to any Oscars night, especially to those subsisting on a five-hour-long diet of game-day snacks, booze, and lost bets. Emilia Pérez is certainly not an outlier in the category, though, so be prepared for the kind of awards night chaos that keeps us from crawling under the covers early.