'Emilia Perez' movie melds Mexican culture with musical melodies

For Zoe Saldana, whose parents were Spanish-speaking immigrants to the U.S., the opportunity to finally play a Spanish-speaking Latina role makes her latest movie, Emilia Perez, rather special.

"The moment I embarked on this career in cinema, I rarely ever got the opportunity to play a full-on Latina that could speak fluently in Spanish consistently in a story," she said.

"And I was yearning for that."

"Emilia Perez" is a musical crime and comedy film, mostly set in Mexico City, written and directed by French director Jacques Audiard.

FILE PHOTO: Cast member Zoe Saldana attends a screening of the film Emilia Perez on the opening night of the 28th Annual American French Film Festival in Los Angeles, California, U.S., October 29, 2024. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni/File Photo

Based on Audiard's opera libretto of the same name, "Emilia Perez" was released in the UK and Ireland last week and arrives in U.S. and Canadian theaters on Friday. It will stream on Netflix NFLX.O on Nov. 13.

In the film, Saldana portrays a jaded lawyer stuck in a dead-end job who helps drug cartel leader Juan "Manitas" Del Monte, played by Karla Sofia Gascon, to fake his death and transition from a man to a woman named Emilia Perez.

The cast also includes singer Selena Gomez as Jessi Del Monte, the wife of the cartel leader.

For Gomez, playing Jessi enabled her to connect her culture and career in a new way.

"That's a huge part of my life that I didn't feel connected to for a while, just because I started to work when I was 7, and most of my jobs were in English," Gomez said.

"So, I really felt like this was important."

Similarly, as a transgender woman, Gascon felt portraying Emilia required an authentic approach.

She recalled that Audiard said Emilia needed to be her own person, different from Juan.

"I told him if we work these characters so separately, distinct, people won't believe this is real. So, what we did was work Manitas as Manitas, work Emilia as Emilia," she said.

"Think of it as a cook adding ingredients, ingredients of Manitas and Emilia."

Understanding the cultural richness of Mexico City and leaning into the talent of the Latina actors, Audiard found himself on what he called a "collective adventure" with everyone working on the film.

"It was completely new; we'd never made a musical," he said.

"We had singing, we had dancing, we had dialogue, we had sets, and it was all at the same time, and that was exhilarating," he added.