Reading Time: 4 minutes
The nominees for the 97th Academy Awards were announced today.
And as usual, the list contained some major surprises.
Some big names were snubbed, while other major talents received their very first nominations.
But the biggest shocker of all might have been the absolute dominance of Emilia Perez.
Emilia Perez Is Set to Win Big at the Oscars
The French-produced Netflix film scored a whopping 13 nominations, making it tied for the second-most nods of all time.
(It’s a several-way tie that includes such cinematic heavy-hitters as Gone With the Wind, Forrest Gump, and Oppenheimer.)
The film also received more noms than any other 2024 film by a considerable margin. The Brutalist and Wicked tied for second most nominations with 10 each.
So good news, right? The most nominated film of the year is an energetic musical that features such beloved stars as Selena Gomez and Zoe Saldaña.
And it’s available on a streaming service you probably already subscribe to! What could be better?
Well, we hate to rain on your cinephile parade, but Emilia Perez has become sort of a lightning rod for controversy in recent months, and not for the reasons you might expect.
The film tells the story of Manitas Del Monte, the fictional head of a Mexican drug cartel who undergoes gender-affirming surgery to become the title character.
Obviously, that’s not the sort of premise one hears every day, and Emilia Perez showcases stories that are seldom seen in mainstream cinema.
But the film’s critics say it’s not doing so responsibly. At all.
The (Many) Criticisms of Emilia Perez
For starters, French director Jacques Audiard has been widely criticized for hiring a mostly non-Mexican cast and crew, including several actors (including Selena) who are not fluent in Spanish.
Audiard does not speak Spanish himself, and when addressing concerns that he chose not to film in Mexico — or even to study Mexican culture before embarking on this project — he’s come off as glib and dismissive.
“Did Shakespeare need to go all the way to Verona to write a story about that place?” Audiard once asked his critics.)
Given its storyline — which centers a number of hot-button social issues — you might assume that the film has been targeted by conservative groups who take issue with the its trans protagonist and drug-money-fueled storylines.
But in an ironic twist worthy of an Oscar-winning screenplay, the loudest complaints about Emilia Perez have mostly come from the progressive end of the political spectrum.
(In fairness, that might be a result of the fact that conservatives were less likely to be familiar with the ultra-niche film, a situation that may change as a result of today’s nominations.)
Those who might normally be inclined to praise the movie for its prominent representation of a trans character have instead been pointing out that 1. Said portrayal is not terribly nuanced or sensitive, and 2. I Saw the TV Glow — a film that offered a much more compassionate and insightful take on the trans experience — was snubbed by the Academy entirely.
GLAAD slammed the film as “a profoundly retrograde portrayal of a trans woman”.
“Emilia Perez is a regressive movie that thinks it’s woke. It will probably win an Oscar,” Vox lamented before comparing the film to Crash, another derided (and now largely forgotten) Oscar darling that scored big by playing on left-leaning sympathies.
“I’m sorry, but EMILIA PEREZ getting 13 Oscar nominations is instantly one of the funniest things that has ever happened at the Oscars,” critic Sonny Bunch wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
“I can’t even wrap my head around ‘Emilia Pérez’ getting THIRTEEN (13!!!) #Oscars nominations. Quite possibly the worst movie ever (mid-scores from audiences & critics) to get double digit nominations. Baffling,” echoed podcast host Jeff D. Lowe.
Lowe added a clip of one of the film’s much-mocked musical sequences.
It serves as a reminder that in addition to the criticism it’s received from the Left, Emilia Perez is not a film that’s likely to appeal to the more centrist denizens of Middle America, either.
In other words, a big night Audiard and his cast might lead to some very low ratings for this year’s Oscars telecast.
Leave a Reply