Maria Full of Grace
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Movie Reviews of Maria Full of Grace
Movie Review: Not for the faint of heart...or stomach.
Summary: 5 Stars
I chose this DVD because I'd read so many rave reviews. I thought it would be grim and slow-moving, but in fact the film combines nail-biting suspense with a powerful message. And it's got the kind of gritty realism you see in Magadalene Sisters -- not sparing any details, but not dramatizing either. Evil can be so mundane.
Other reviewers have summarized the plot extremely well -- no need for another recap. Marston's Director's Commentary adds a whole new dimension to the viewing experience. He's unabashedly delivering a message. The "mules" are often above-poverty people who want to make some serious money and there's no other way. The dealers aren't slimy gangsters but human beings. In fact, the dealer who drafts Maria is a portrayed as a soft-spoken man who asks Maria about her life and her problems -- realistic, says Marston.
I hadn't known the details of mules who carry drugs in their stomachs. But I don't think a PrimeTimeLive or Sixty Minutes spot would capture the feeling we get as we watch Maria forcing herself to swallow pills and her too-full feeling afterward. The odds aren't good: out of four on this flight, one dies, one gets caught and two have a narrow escape.
Marston wants to portray the characters as three-dimensional. He wants to avoid the bad-guy customs agent and the saintly heroine, and I believe he succeeds. The casting is a brilliant combination of professionals and first-time amateurs and they're all solid and believable.
Marston argues that the drug war won't be won by military and criminal systems; it's social and economic. Other films like Traffic make the same point. It's easy to feel helpless, realizing we're still spending billions to "fight" drugs and people like Maria are getting on planes every day.
Movie Review: Disturbingly, Drugs Might Set Some People Free
Summary: 5 Stars
Maria Alvarez works in a flower factory in Columbia, de-thorning roses for a living at the brusque age of seventeen. Her hands ache and bleed, her boss is verbally abusive, and her family (as most seventeen year olds think) don't understand that she wants more out of life. Then one day she meets a young boy who introduces her to a drug runner who hires "mules" (women who carry drugs in their stomachs and into the United States) and Maria's life changes drastically.
But is it all for the worst?
That's tough to say. Although we all know the terrible things that happen to these young girls (rapes, the pellets leaking in their stomachs and killing them, being arrested by border agents, etc.), the viewer has kind of a dark sympathy for Maria and her fellow mules. The amount of money they can make in one trip ($5,000) is a simple treasure to them.
It took me a while to review this film simply because it IS so disturbing. The drug trade is a terrible thing that kills people all the time, but in this film we get to see how it benefits one individual ...but at what cost? Emotionally she's nearly torn apart (she has to watch another mule slowly, painfully, die after a drug pellet leaks in her stomach), but it also makes her a stronger person. She has means (via cash) to support herself and, come to find out, her unborn child.
Will Maria remain in America, or return to her family in Columbia and raise her child there while continuing to be a mule? You'll have to watch it and find out.
A simple film with a powerful message; a message that isn't as easy to swallow as a pouch full of heroin.
Movie Review: Maria's Troubled Journey
Summary: 5 Stars
"Maria Full of Grace" is a touching, yet at times frightening, film that deserves a wider audience than those of the art house circuit. Unfortunately, it has always been the case that films wholly or partly subtitled miss out on mass market distribution. This is a shame. Many such films, including "Maria", are truly excellent and deserve broader accolades than they receive.
The story of "Maria" covers the life of Maria Alavarez (brilliantly played by Catalina Sandino Moreno) whose life revolves around providing for her mother, her sister and her sister's baby from the wages she earns dethorning roses in rural Colombia. She hates her work and her boss. Ultimately, she quits in frustration. Coinciding with this, she realises that she is pregnant to her boyfriend who is probably best described as a loser. Her life seems to have little upside.
Maria's solution is to work as a mule in order to carry heroin from Bogota to New York. It's a potentially lucrative trade. She swallows 62 capsules of the drug. Her journey is troubled as she escapes the authorities in New York simply because she is pregnant and therefore cannot be X-rayed. She also sees the brutal and unrelenting side of the trade when one of her fellow mules is killed to retrieve the cargo she is carrying in her system. Life in this business is cheap.
Without revealing the end, it can be said that the film is great. The characters are very plausible and the film seems to have no special axe to grind. See this film for the strength of its characters. Do not be persuaded otherwise simply because of the requirement to read subtitles.
Movie Review: Impressive.
Summary: 5 Stars
Viewed: 4/07
Rate: 9
4/07: I hadn't heard of the picture Maria Full of Grace until I spotted the title in a DVD movie book with reviews and ratings. The review was favorable, and I shelved the title on my list of movies to see. It's been there for some while until I finally spotted it in a local library. I hadn't known the story yet until watching the picture. When the first mention of the city Bogota showed up, I thought it was obviously going to be a story about drugs. When it was, I was right until I realized where the picture will lead me. It's a quite astounding story, and a wonderfully made picture at that. Its drawback is that it doesn't feel realistic enough. Nonetheless, the performances throughout the film are outstanding and outstanding. Catalina Sandino Moreno carried the film all the way from start to end. Maria Full of Grace painted a somber picture of girls who swallow pellets of drugs. When I say pellets, I mean the size of meatballs with cocaine in them. When I say pellets of drugs, that's in the vicinity of seventy of them. Sounds like your worst case of digestive system nightmare. And yes, it is. Aside from that, the walk-through of the young girl's life was well-appreciated, self-paced, and absorbing. I was pleased with the two sides of the story: Colombia and New York. Both were handled extremely well with the same level of excellence. That New York side was rather heightened with fear, anxiety, and suspense. All in all, since it does not glorify the surroundings like City of God, Maria Full of Grace is a very impressive picture.
Movie Review: Gritty and gripping
Summary: 5 Stars
Wow. While a bit of a downer at times, I found Maria Full of Grace fascinating and, ultimately, hopeful. Maria lives in Columbia, and she works long, humiliating hours at a flower plantation. She chafes under the supervision of her pompous supervisor, but her family needs her checks to pay for necessities such as medicine. After a particularly difficult day, Maria finally quits her job. Her sister (who, incidentally, doesn't even have a job) is thrown into an uproar. Shortly thereafter, Maria meets Franklin, a silver-tongued young man who is involved in the country's illicit drug trade, at a party. Franklin promises Maria big bucks and the chance to travel if she will serve as a drug mule, smuggling cocaine into America. (He doesn't mention up front that Maria will have to swallow approximately 60 laytex-wrapped pellets of the drug to make the transfer.) Maria, who has recently discovered that she is pregnant, makes a desperate grab at the opportunity.
This was a very powerful film. Catalina Sandino Moreno, who plays Maria, turns in a truly star performance. Although the situations Maria is faced with are definitely high-stakes, Moreno never overacts or emotes. Maria is a thinker. She considers her decisions; even though most of her options are unpleasant, she weighs them carefully. Moreno portrays this measured quality wonderfully. I highly recommend this film. It's filmed in Spanish, with subtitles, but the performances are so good that you'll hardly notice. No nudity, some language, and very gritty material in some scenes.