“Maria
Full of Grace”
Fine Line Features/HBO Films
Written and directed by Joshua Marston
Produced by Paul Mezey
Starring Catalina Sandino Moreno,
Yenny Paola Vega, Guilied López, John Alex Toro, Patricia Rae
and Orlando Tobón
In English and Spanish (with English subtitles)
Rated R
(out of four)
Joshua Marston’s “Maria
Full of Grace” explores
the drug industry not through the eyes of drug lords,
crooked businessmen or violent hoods, but as it reveals
itself to a young Colombian woman who has so few
options that becoming a “mule” seems
to be a sound decision. This is a film that doesn’t
just look at the industry, but the society that allows
it to thrive and leads girls to carry heroin in their
stomachs.
American director Marston made the wise decision
to shoot the film in Spanish with a Colombian crew,
and cast young actress Catalina Sandino Moreno as
Maria, a 17-year-old Colombian who finds herself
in the drug smuggling industry. In her film debut,
Moreno offers a brilliant portrayal of a woman who
has to make her own decisions about what direction
to take her life.
Marston creates a beautiful, neo-realism-inspired
look throughout the film, opening with a frank slice-of-life
sequence depicting Maria’s living conditions.
She resides in a cramped multigenerational house
where what little money she makes in a horrible job
stripping thorns from roses is expected to go directly
to the family. Meanwhile, she’s just told her
boyfriend that she’s pregnant, but isn’t
impressed with his offer of marriage—he doesn’t
love her, so they couldn’t have a very good
life together.
After she rebels and quits her job, she meets Franklin
(John Alex Toro), a motorcycle-riding man with money
who introduces Maria to options that will make her
money and let her go to New York City. The older
man in charge of the smuggling is almost fatherly
in his kindness and offering of money, but there’s
also the sense that he wouldn’t hesitate to
severely punish her if anything goes wrong.
She must swallow more than 60 one-and-a-half by
three-quarter inch rubber pellets encasing heroin
and carry them in her stomach on a plane and through
customs in New York City. If she has to go to the
bathroom, she has to re-swallow what comes out and
deliver every pellet—without one missing—to
the recipients in New York.
Swallowing those pellets is quite an endeavor, and
Marston captures the long, uncomfortable experience
that the mules go through, first learning to swallow
grapes. If any pellets break, it means death through
overdose, but the mules, like Lucy (Guilied López),
Maria’s new friend who has done it twice, still
do it. Before leaving, Lucy walks Maria through the
process and the dangers—she needs to continue
to do it to earn money. This job isn’t going
to set anyone up for life, and the illusion to this
fact falls apart quickly.
Marston’s honesty with the subject matter
demands that the characters have real motives and
real feelings. He refuses to demonize any characters,
but represents them as they would act in their situations.
Like the nice but threatening boss in Columbia, the
thugs who pick up the drugs in New York are familiar
and bored with their jobs, but also have to be violent
or threatening if it's required of them. No characters
are perfect, but none are pure evil. Whether or not
she’s making wise decisions, Maria’s
motives are always clear and her complex thoughts
laid out through Moreno’s performance.
So Maria and some of her colleagues end up on an
airplane to New York City in one of the most stunning
scenes of the year. The scene is a claustrophobic
nightmare of real problems and paranoia. While most
of the people sleep, the mules, who aren’t
supposed to make contact with one another, exchange
recognizable glances and Maria deals with some unexpected
problems and witnesses more among her friends. Marston
uses the dimly lit plane as a sort of purgatory,
where the girls have no escape from the law or medical
problems if something goes wrong, physically or mentally.
In New York City, Marston’s casting again
recalls neo-realism some more. Orlando Tobón—a
Colombian émigré who owns a travel
agency in Queens, where he helps Colombian immigrants
find their place and helps repatriate the bodies
of drug mules who didn’t make it—plays
a warm character very much based on himself. As Don
Fernando, he brings warmth and hope to Maria’s
story and is one of several people who demonstrate
some of the positive contributions of Colombian Americans.
On the other side of the customs office, the film
continues with unexpected turns as Maria arrives
in New York City and desperately tries to find the
right way to handle her situation. Marston never
flinches in his realistic portrait of his character’s
lives, never inserts unnecessary action or contrived
plot points. “Maria Full of Grace” demands
that the audience not just look at a social problem
that destroys many lives, but understand the people
involved.
jeremy@red-mag.com