Watched Emilia Perez today. I would give it a 3.5/5 rating. Not a bad film, but it also seems to remain frustratingly superficial (in the sense of "on the surface") with only occasional glimpses of deeper revelation.
The music is fine. If someone hates music as part of their films (which means they probably hate Hamilton and dislike La-La Land and some Disney pics), then sure I get the malcontent. It's not music in the sense of Joker 2 either (which was basically a story with occasional new covers of old 40-50's songs, it's more in the sense of a musical -- but at least it is done consistently and becomes part of the movie's tapestry.
EP is a bit annoying in its obsession early about surgical procedures and also in making the clinic look wide, spacious, and wealthy. I don't know what the foreign centers are like nowadays, but 15 years ago the best doctors in the world (of which there was a handful of ten), while perhaps treating a lot of people overall, had pretty much "hole in wall" clinics. The exteriors were kind of shoved in among poorer settings, and the interiors were small, not spacious, and very efficient, with few extra rooms or staff.
I personally found Emilia's boy presentation a bit haunting in that I recognized the male persona with female body positioning -- how the hands and arms are held and positioned even when sitting, how the body is trying to pull in on itself to not look so large, etc. Maybe cis people would not recognize it but it all leapt out to me as the small signals and things one does to alleviate even a bit the discomfort of gender incongruity.
The film does have this awkward balance between glamorizing Emilia and judging her. It also makes gender transition look easy - which in some ways it is if you have a ton of money. (Take another look at Caitlyn Jenner, whose money afforded her the ability to not really integrate well as a woman otherwise because she thought her appearance -- which money can really help with -- was enough.) Mostly it avoids saying much at all, but at times there are flashes of conflict between the horrible things Emilia did as as drug lord and her persona after transition. We assume she feels some guilt over the things she did or felt compelled to do to survive, by her funding the operation to recover the bodies of cartel victims so their families get closure, but again she is still very rich from her drug profits and still living the wealthy lifestyle. Is there a sacrifice truly being made by her as recompense, aside from time and effort?
One of the true dilemmas is wanting to move on to a new life but being emotionally intertwined with your old. pretending to be her sons' aunt is eventually no longer good enough when Emilia's former wife (who does not yet know she has been living in her husband's, not husband's sister's, house) wants to move on with a new family and take the children along. So we do get a jarring scene of Emilia forgetting herself and lashing out physically and emotionally because they are "her kids" and she is losing them again in a way. But this is the dilemma most transitioners experience. Emilia is privileged by her money to have been able to have her kids back to some degree for additional time. Emilia set this in motion by privatizing her gender transition and abandoning her male identity entirely rather than being willing to be out to her ex-wife and kids. So this is what happens. But it does draw a point of continuity between the old male version of Emilia and her current incarnation -- that anger over having her children taken away resorts in some physical and emotional responses that are reflective of the person she also used to be.
Eventually this ends up badly for everyone involved. So I found the film's ending rather unsatisfying. What was this film trying to say? Nothing really got resolved. Nothing was really realized per se, because we never got to see any kind of resolution between Emilia and the ex and the children. The film ends with kind of a homage to her public persona that just feels empty and not really addressing the totality of Emilia.
Gascon does a great job at playing a man at the beginning of the film, and of course is entirely fine as Emilia. Best Actress of the year? I'm kind of indifferent. Saldana might actually do more heavy lifting in this film. It's a reminder of much fire Saldana typically brings to her roles, whether they are serious dramatic roles, action films, or comedy.
