‘Emilia Pérez’ divides Mexico: Critics decry ‘glorification of vaginoplasty,’ fans call it ‘extraordinary’

Magnificent, awful, insulting, and pure cinema — these are just a few of the adjectives used to describe Emilia Pérez, the French film directed by Jacques Audiard, since it was lauded at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2024. Mexico, where the film is set, was one of the last places to see its release. However, that didn’t stop users on X (formerly Twitter), many of them Mexican, from lambasting the movie.

The first comment to make waves came in December from comedian Eugenio Derbez, who called Selena Gomez’s performance as Jessica del Monte — the wife of a powerful drug lord who decides to undergo a gender transition — “indefensible.” Gomez responded, explaining that she did the best she could with the limited time she had. This sparked so many hateful comments at Derbez that the comedian ended up issuing a public apology. But as snippets of the film leaked onto social media, the sentiment began to shift: not only was Gomez’s performance deemed indefensible, but so was the entire film.

Following its theatrical release, film critic Ernesto Diezmartínez remarked that while Emilia Pérez and its portrayal of a violent boss seeking to transform into a benevolent woman seemed like a natural progression in Audiard’s career, the film suffers from clumsy execution and lackluster direction. He also criticized the attempt to tell the story through the escapist and artificial lens of the musical genre, calling it a waste of potential. “Everything Audiard had done well before now went wrong; everything he had done poorly before, turned out even worse,” the critic concluded.

Rodrigo Prieto, director of photography for Barbie and Killers of the Flower Moon, and director of Pedro Páramo, also offered a harsh critique of the film, though his opinion did not cause as much of an online stir. In an interview, he praised the musical aspect of the film and expressed no opposition to foreign directors telling stories about Mexico. However, he criticized the decision not to hire a Mexican production or costume designer — or at least some local consultants — arguing that this made the story feel inauthentic.

But unlike Prieto, Dominican trans activist Mikaelah Drullard does not believe a musical was a tasteful choice of genre for the movie. “I don’t see the parents of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa singing at a table ‘Where are my children that the army made disappear?’, alongside the glorification of vaginoplasty as a form of redemption for the victimizer,” Drullard says in her critique published in the feminist media outlet Volcánicas, in reference to the 2014 disappearance of students from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers’ College in Mexico. For the trans activist, Emilia Pérez reflects Eurocentric ignorance of white people, which explains its positive reception by award-winning European and American audiences.

The film has been in the spotlight for over nine months. It won the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and four actresses — Karla Sofía Gascón, Zoe Saldaña, Adriana Paz, and Selena Gomez — were awarded Best Actress. The Cannes festival, held each spring in the south of France, wields significant influence over global film criticism.

At the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA), Emilia Pérez received nine nominations. At the Golden Globes, it won eight out of its 10 nominations. It also won five awards at the European Film Awards, including Best Film and Best European Screenwriter, and it was named Film of the Year by the American Film Institute.

Last Thursday, January 23, the Oscars announced that the narco-musical is competing in 13 categories, just one nomination shy of the 14 historic nominations earned by Titanic, La La Land, and All About Eve.

In an interview with EL PAÍS, director Jacques Audiard responded to critics who describe Emilia Pérez as an absurd representation of Mexico and accuse it of handling the issues of violence and disappearances with little tact. “I didn’t want to make a movie about drug traffickers, and I didn’t make a movie about drug traffickers. It’s the story of a person who wants to change their life. It’s not a redemption story for drug trafficking. Why deny a person the opportunity to become what they want to be?” he said.

But not all Mexicans have criticized the movie. One notable exception is Guillermo del Toro. During a conversation with Audiard in October last year, following a special screening for members of the Directors Guild of America (DGA), the Mexican director — who had been part of two juries that awarded the film at Cannes and Venice — praised the “wise” use of light in Emilia Pérez, saying “It’s so beautiful to see a movie that is cinema.” Audiard seemed taken aback, almost as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and thanked del Toro with deep respect.

Issa López, a Mexican screenwriter and director who wrote six episodes for the latest season of True Detective, echoed del Toro’s sentiments. On the Golden Globes red carpet, she called the film a masterpiece and praised Audiard’s portrayal of Mexican reality, stating that no Mexican director could have done it better.

Even Pati Chapoy, host of the Mexican TV show Ventaneando, joined the chorus of praise. She declared during a broadcast that Emilia Pérez is a cinematic gem, stating, “You don’t know what an extraordinary film it is.” Her co-hosts, however, remained silent, staring at her in stunned silence. It was one of those moments of Mexican television that often surprises, reminiscent of when Galilea Montijo mistakenly believed that Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma was about the Italian capital, and not a neighborhood in Mexico City.

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