Mexican Moviegoers Ask for Refunds After Watching ‘Emilia Pérez’ — & the Government Got Involved
Netflix
There’s a lot of conversation surrounding the controversial film Emilia Pérez – especially in Mexico. Though the musical crime film brought Afro-Latina actress Zoe Saldaña her first Oscar nomination, not all of Latin America is celebrating the film as a total win. Mexico – where the film is supposedly based – isn’t giving the film much praise at all. In fact, moviegoers are asking for refunds after not being satisfied with the film – and Mexico’s Federal Consumer Protection Agency (PROFECO) got involved.
Emilia Pérez is one of this year’s buzziest films – and it’s only getting more talked about now that it’s nominated for 13 Academy Awards. But not everyone is happy with the film. In Mexico, patrons were allegedly asking for refunds after watching the movie and being denied. That’s because the movie chain Cinépolis has a refund policy called “Cinépolis Guarantee” where customers could get a refund if they weren’t satisfied with the film. The refund plea got so popular that the Federal Consumer Protection Agency (PROFECO) had to step in to make clarifications after Cinépolis’ was claiming it wasn’t a guarantee, but a “recommendation.”
During a press conference with Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum (Jan. 27), PROFECO’s representative Iván Escalante said that he was in contact with Cinépolis and that they came to the conclusion that the chain company would have to change the language of the policy or detail its terms. “What we did was to look for the company to tell them either to withdraw the term ‘guarantee’ and put ‘recommendation’ or to give us a policy guaranteeing what you are going to give to the consumers to support this phrasing,” Escalante reportedly said during the conference.
Cinépolis decided to keep their “Cinépolis Guarantee” phrase and make their policy clear. However, Escalante also said that moviegoers can still submit a claim if they feel the need to.
You can look up the terms online now, which states that moviegoers can only ask for a refund within the first 30 minutes of the film, among other conditions.