EMILIA PEREZ: Change Isn’t Trying to Make Your Old Self Disappear

Being who you are is the most important thing in the world. That often means change. But change isn’t about trying to make your old self disappear. Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez clearly shows how and why that doesn’t work. Going from one kind of hiding to another is never the answer.

There are reasons for hiding, though. Fear. Shame. Judgment. Or, being the former kingpin of a drug cartel. Manitas Del Monte/Emilia Perez needs protection from violence or death; even guilt.

Yet, when you run from things to protect yourself, you’re forced to run from others. Those others, for Emilia, are her beloved children. Even a violent drug lord is capable of love. So, in Emilia’s desperation to be who she’s meant to be, there are a few things she doesn’t think of.

Well-Planned Change (Sort Of) In Emilia Perez

Manitas (Karla Sofía Gascón) has been transitioning from he to her for 2 years when Emilia Perez begins. This change hasn’t gone to his liking. He’s got money, loads of it, to make it happen right.

But secretly. (It’s all been and will be done in secret; face coverings and all for the enlisted). He interviews a hungry, fed-up, lawyer not getting her due pay or acknowledgment. It’s Rita Moro Castro (Zoe Saldana). And, boy, does she have no clue of the emotional rollercoaster she’s in for.

Blindfolded and masked for the plane ride to his quarters, Rita is presented to a man. He’s a rough, cruel man (if he needs to be, and he does), who tells her his story and makes his demands known. An unexpected story, with its pathos and pain – he’s meant to be a woman. He must. Can she help?

Intrigued, Rita feels for him – plus there’s a lot of money in it for her. That’s more than appealing. It seems like a sort of simple in-and-out situation. Find the right doctor, make sure the doctor’s good, set up the plans, and get his wife and children to Switzerland to start a new life.

Not just for safety, but out of his way.

Rita’s paid. Makes a couple of million. It’s done. But, not so quickly. What looks pretty “easy,” isn’t. Especially the part about simply disappearing from his old life and doing that by faking his death.

Manitas didn’t think that out so well. But, then again, drug lords are used to numbing their feelings.

Faking Death of Body & Feelings

Is it a foolproof plan? Manitas and Rita think it is. Why wouldn’t it work? It isn’t out of the question for a violent kingpin to be killed off by his competitors. And, his (her) family will be safe in Switzerland, with the money Manitas has made sure they’ll have. What could go wrong, right?

Emilia Perez can finally be born into the full glory of her true identity and live happily ever after. Right? Right? Well, maybe not. Because you might believe you can kill off your old self with all the feelings that belonged to it – good and bad. Wanting to atone for your bad past, that’s one thing.

But what about missing the children you love? And, even your wife, Jessi (Selena Gomez), too? That, Emilia Perez, doesn’t quite account for. She doesn’t know enough about her feelings. Doesn’t realize  (like a lot of people) that feelings don’t disappear, even if they’re numbed and buried.

And, you never really forget, either. That comes as a rather unpleasant surprise to Emilia Perez …

Wait, No One Can Ever “Forget?”

That realization, of missing her family, doesn’t happen until after everything is done. The logistics of becoming Emila Perez are well-planned. Everything (except feelings, is taken care of to a “T.”)

Before Manitas disappears and fakes his death, he plays with his two little boys and wife. He loves all three of them. That’s clear. (It might be a surprise, but maybe it shouldn’t be).

Violent kingpins might be practiced in numbing a lot of feelings. Yet, that doesn’t mean they don’t love. And, Manitas/Emilia loves deeply. Rita, who has no children, and lives by pushing aside her feelings, too, including longings for children and love, assures him: “They’ll forget you. They will.”

But not so fast. Children don’t forget. Losses etch deeply into your bones. The boys want their dad. Deep inside, Manitas’s soul hurts. Goodbyes are never simply Goodbyes. Forgetting is a myth.

And, so, let’s wonder:

Did Manitas/Emilia try to disappear her little boys, the same as she wants to disappear the boy/man inside her that she never wanted to be – as if that self can be sent away without a trace? Seems so.

Sadly, trying to make your feelings disappear locks you inside a self-imposed prison. Not consciously, of course. But Manitas/Emila couldn’t be responsible for murders and hurting people and families if she let herself feel much, could she? Let alone the pain of living a secret life.

So, here’s the conviction she lives with: “I have no desire.”

But numbed feelings live on. The past is in us, whether you want it to be or not. Pretending doesn’t work. Then, you might find yourself, like Emilia Perez, searching for “the disappeared” for others.

Yet, what about what’s “disappeared” inside Emilia? You can’t kill your feelings. Or old self.

No, You Can’t “Kill” Your Feelings

You can try. But you have to keep tight control over them in one way or another. Including control over the behavior (and feelings) of people in your life who stir up the feelings you want gone.

No, Emilia can’t bear living without her boys. So, she concocts another plan. Four years later, she shows up in London at the same dinner as Rita Moro Castro. She terrifies Rita, who thinks Emilia wants to kill her so that there are no witnesses left to her past identity. But, that’s not it.

Emilia Perez wants Rita’s help again. She wants her to bring the children and Jessi back to Mexico. Tell them Monitas’s “aunt” has appeared. They will all live with her (together as a family, again ..)

But that’s not so easy when you want control. When you’re afraid of loss or interference (with the desires you don’t think you have. And, Emilia tyrannizes Jessi. Like Manitas, she’ll get what she wants. Manitas isn’t (all) gone. This isn’t love, it’s a tyrannical need that holds those she loves hostage so she doesn’t lose them. Loss can feel unbearable.

And, Emilia won’t feel it.

Jessi is the spoils for her keeping her boys in her life, as their secret mother. So, as “Auntie,” Emilia pushes Jessi out. She takes over. Jessi sort of likes the freedom to be with Gustavo (Edgar Ramírez).  After all, she needs love too. Manitas left her lonely even before his disappearance.

Though she can’t be entirely different than who she was, Emilia Perez does try to do some good.

“Doing Good” For the Disappeared

“Losing a loved one is a tragedy. Losing the remains is a life sentence.” That’s how Emilia lives.

She says: “We’re finding the disappeared so that the disappeared can reappear … The nightmare can be faced … mother and child can be reunited. So deep down, there rests strength and hope. A missing boy. A grieving mother. A missing father. A grieving family.”

Re-emerging as “Auntie,” she doesn’t see she’s left this in her wake; disappearing without a trace.

Emilia thought she’d left it all behind. But changing who you are as if your old self never existed, doesn’t mean you didn’t “kill” some things that are quite precious inside you. Emilia begins to see.

Falling in love with Epifania (Adriana Paz) means not only finding more of her loving self but also remembering the love she had for another woman – Jessi. And, the part of herself she rejected.

She tries to make good on her past misdeeds and crimes. And, to do so, she helps families find their loved ones. Even their dead remains. Where are the dead remains of Manitas/Emilia?

She sings to Epifania: Half he, half she …You can’t know yourself or be yourself if you numb your real feelings. Feelings are the real you. Emilia lied to herself. No one ever forgets.

And everyone has desires.  It’s all undercover until Jessi happily announces she’s getting married to Gustavo. They’ll buy a villa. Shocked, Emilia asks, where will the children live? With Jessi, of course. Her children are hers. She’s shocked that “Auntie” would think otherwise.

It doesn’t end well when disappeared feelings return with a vengeance from their burial place: her rage, old brutality; need for control. The things she’s never faced.

With the threat of losing her children, all hell breaks loose.

Violent Return of Disappeared Feelings

Any kind of change means knowing, and facing, “who you are.”

That, Emila Perez didn’t know how to do. It’s not her fault. But feelings don’t disappear. And, when her buried feelings are triggered: Well, “Manitas returns.”

With all the jealousy. Terror of loss. Rage. Revenge. Punishing Jessi by cutting off her money. Beating up Gustavo. It’s total desperation, for Emilia Perez.

But the old Manitas, who relied on violence to cover her femininity isn’t a match for Gustavo’s rage. Gustavo chops off Emilia’s carefully manicured fingers and sends them to Rita, who is now her close friend.  In the end, Emilia Perez is revealed as the hostage she’s been.

A hostage to her lies. To her attempts to hide her full reality and deny her old self. To not being open with Jessi. Yet, too late, the truth comes pouring out.

Emilia Perez reveals to Jessi things only Manitas knows. Her son had said: “You smell like Papa, papa, papa …” Now, Jessi knows. This is her husband whom Gustavo is trying to kill. Her grief is overwhelming. She tries to stop him. But it’s too late. All three die in a fiery crash.

That’s the worst that can happen when feelings are disappeared and left for dead. Yes, it’s important to be who you are. The whole of you. But, change isn’t about trying to make your old self disappear. That self and all your feelings have to be faced. They are still part of who you are.

As Emilia Perez sings to Epifania: “Half him, Half her, Half papa, Half aunt, half kingpin, half queen, half here, half there ... Who am I? I am what I feel.” That’s right, you are all of you.