Songfacts®:

• "El Mal" is from the 2024 Spanish-language movie Emilia Pérez, which you probably heard about during awards season. It won Best Motion Picture – Musical Or Comedy at the Golden Globes, and star Zoe Saldaña earned a number of accolades for her role as a lawyer named Rita in the film. The song is used in a climactic scene where the lead character, Emilia (played by Karla Sofia Gascón), is speaking at a charity benefit. Rita is Emilia's lawyer and has defended her, overlooking her shady dealings. At the benefit, Rita can take no more and goes on a musical rampage against the donors as she breaks into "El Mal," which means "The Evil" in Spanish.
• In the film, Zoe Saldaña dances around the ballroom, jumping on tables and singling out guests for their misdeeds like drug-running and usury. It's all very musical theater, with the guests barely reacting and Emilia continuing her speech.
• The song was written by Clément Ducol and Camille, with the film's director, Jacques Audiard, contributing some lyrics. Camille also sings backup on the track.
  
  Ducol and Camille are both French and have a long-standing collaboration, with Ducol playing on and producing many of Camille songs as an artist. They've also teamed up to produce songs for other artists and music for other films, but Emilia Pérez is their most notable collaboration - they did all the music for the film.
• Zoe Saldana does most of the singing, but the song is credited to "Zoe Saldana, Karla Sofia Gascón & Camille." Gascón shows up in just a few parts where she sings her speech, and Camille sings in the background. Of the three, Camille is the only one who is primarily a singer - she's released several albums.
• "El Mal" won the Oscar for Best Original Song, beating out another Emilia Pérez song, "Mi Camino," and three more mellow, affecting songs (the kind that usually win), including Elton John's "Never Too Late."
• At the Oscars ceremony, Camile appeared in a video where she explained: "'El Mal' allows the character Rita to express everything she's been feeling so far. To denounce the corrupt people and to protect Emilia."
  
  When the song won, she said, "We wrote 'El Mal' as a song to denounce corruption, and we hope it speaks to the role music and art can play as a force of good and progress in the world."
• According to Clément Ducol, the keyboard riff is a little detail that adds a new layer to the track. He says it makes the song sound like "a cabaret in hell."
• Clément Ducol called "El Mal" a "song of emancipation."
• At the Oscars, the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown was up for Best Picture (won by Anora). When Mick Jagger presented the Best Original Song award, he joked that Dylan was the first choice as presenter, but he said they "should find somebody younger."