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Maria Full of Grace (2004)

Catalina Sandino Moreno , Joshua Marston  |  R |  DVD
4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (161 customer reviews)

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Product Details

  • Actors: Catalina Sandino Moreno
  • Directors: Joshua Marston
  • Writers: Joshua Marston
  • Format: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
  • Language: Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1)
  • Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
  • Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Rated: R (Restricted)
  • Studio: Hbo Home Video
  • DVD Release Date: December 7, 2004
  • Run Time: 101 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (161 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B0002TT0MI
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #12,919 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
  • Learn more about "Maria Full of Grace" on IMDb

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

When a movie can blend passionate social concern with good old-fashioned suspense, it must be doing something right. Maria Full of Grace scores high on both counts. Maria is a Colombian teenager who, for a large paycheck, agrees to be a mule for drug-runners: she has to swallow dozens of thumb-sized capsules of heroin and smuggle them into New York. This debilitating process is painstakingly described, and of course not everything goes as planned when Maria and her fellow mules land in America. Director Joshua Marston is working on a low budget, which explains the film's narrow, single-minded focus--but this may be a strength, not a weakness. The trump card is the lead performance of Catalina Sandrino Moreno, who won awards at the Seattle and Newport Film Festivals. Her empathetic face carries us along on Maria's journey, and humanizes a problem that is too easily relegated to a headline. --Robert Horton

Product Description

(Drama) Maria Alvarez (Catalina Sandino), a bright, spirited 17-year old, lives with three generations of her family in a cramped house in rural Colombia. Desperate to leave her job stripping thorns from flowers in a rose plantation, Maria accepts a lucrative offer to transport packets of heroin-which she must swallow-to the United States. The ruthless world of international drug trafficking proves to be more than Maria bargained for as she becomes ultimately entangled with both drug cartels and immigration officials. The dramatic thriller builds toward a conclusion so powerful and revealing it could only be based on a thousand true stories.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
159 of 163 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Catalina Sandino Moreno's compelling debut performance December 21, 2004
Format:DVD
In this week's "Entertainment Weekly" Stephen King picked "Maria Full of Grace" as his favorite film of 2004, which is certainly an interesting thing to know before watching this independent film from writer-director Joshua Marston. The picture on the DVD cover shows Maria Alvarez (Catalina Sandino Moreno) posed as if she were about to receive Holy Communion. Only instead of receiving the host Maria is about to swallow a pellet containing heroin wrapped in the finger of a latex glove. That particular image is not present in the film with as much symbolism as it is on the cover, but it does represent the crucible of Maria's odyssey.

Maria is 17 and works in Colombia picking the thorns off of roses before they are shipped overseas. Although she is clearly a bright girl, Maria discovers that she is pregnant. To make things worse her boyfriend is a loser, her boss at work is a jerk, and her family needs her to provide money. So after Maria quits her job she is introduced to a man in Bogotá who will give her $5,000 for flying to New York City with 62 of those pellets in her stomach as a "mule" for a drug lord. For Maria that amount is a virtual fortune and seems worth the risk that one of those pellets could break in her stomach and kill her. So she practices swallow grapes so that she will be able to do what needs to be done to get her money.

There will be several mules on this particular flight, a practice known as "shotgunning" that Marston learned about and which inspired his original script. The idea is that if you put several mules on the same plane and plan on U.S. Customs catching one of them, which would make it easier for the rest of the drugs to get through.
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88 of 91 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Forgive her Father, for she has sinned.... August 19, 2004
Maria Full of Grace is a moving and powerful motion picture about a girl who goes in over her head when she longs for a better life. We follow Maria (Catalina Sandino Moreno) from her dead end job stripping roses in Colombia to a new opportunity--becoming a "mule," by ingesting drugs in large capsules and smuggling them to New Jersey. What follows is a gritty, fast-paced, and suspense-filled story

Remember the name Catalina Sandino Moreno. The heartfelt and harrowing performance she gives here has won her a heap of awards and I am sure there are many more to come. First-time director Joshua Marston, who also wrote the taut screenplay, shows Maria being taught how to swallow drugs wrapped in packets -- she sips soup to make them go down without gagging. If the drugs in her belly should seep out during Maria's turbulent jet flight to New York, she could be poisoned or arrested or both. Marston builds incredible tension. But it's the human drama etched on Moreno's young, weary face that gives Maria its potent punch.

This Winner of the Audience Award at Sundance is a terrific film; shocking, engrossing, and entertaining. But what makes Maria Full of Grace an extraordinary experience is its ability to be ordinary. We see everyday life here, plausible motives, convincing decisions, and characters who live at ground level. The movie's suspense is heightened by being generated entirely at the speed of life, and showing us what probably would happen, and not some implausible fairy-tale.
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64 of 69 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars An Indictment of More Than Drug Smugglers July 26, 2008
Format:DVD
Painful and ugly, Maria Llena de Gracia is also a powerful experience of vicarious desperation and deprivation. The story of a village girl in Colombia whose family, novio, and job all fail her at the same moment. She rushes heedlessly into big trouble, which in Colombia can only mean the cocaine trade. Coke merchants and smugglers are not nice people; we know that, and to see this film as an indictment of their viciousness is only a fraction of the movie's content. It's also, and more importantly an indictment of the global economy, the Octopus of our era with far stronger tentacles than the railroad of the early 20th Century. The indictment is clear from the first scene of the movie, when ALL the young women of the community report for work through a high wire fence to the warehouse where roses are trimmed and wrapped for export to North America. There is no other work in the village, no subsistence, no options, no future. If it were in Mexico - and there are exactly the same horrible sweat-shops in NAFTAfied Mexico - one would have at least the option of illegal emigration to El Norte, but in Colombia, it's 'muling' drugs or maid service. Frankly, I doubt that many American viewers of this film really saw what it was about from the Colombian perspective. Stopping the drug traffic isn't just a matter of spraying lethal chemicals over the countryside or supplying arms and helicopters to the latifundistas who own the government, and it isn't just a matter of reducing demand from the two poles of American society - the marginalized Black and the overprivileged White - either. It's a matter of facilitating the recovery of a diverse local economy, in which most people can make a living and a few can even find opportunity without crime and violence.... Read more ›
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15 of 15 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Authentic, honest, and powerful August 18, 2005
Format:DVD
Director Joshua Marston made MARIA FULL OF GRACE on a tight budget, but the result is a compelling closely-focused film which documents a segment of the drug trade while managing to avoid the obvious stereotypes. The story centers around the unhappy teenaged rose-worker Maria, played wonderfully by newcomer Catalina Sandino Moreno, who agrees to swallow heroin for transport to New York in return for a big payoff.

The orchestration and consequences of a single drug run from Colombia to New York comprise the main dramatic content of this film. Throughout, Marston pointedly avoids the caricatures commonly found in the drug film genre. Maria, unhappy throughout, is nevertheless not on the edge of desperation when she makes her choice to become a drug mule. The Colombian drug lord is not the menacing figure one might expect, at least as he is portrayed interviewing Maria for the job and preparing her for her journey. Even the U.S. Customs agents in New York, conceivably an irresistible target for filmmakers with a "message," are portrayed as professional and sympathetic.

One is continuously struck by the detailed realism and honesty of the film; Marston insisted upon using only Colombian actors in the roles of Colombians (though he filmed largely in Ecuador), and the other small details of the movie are indicative of the extensive research that went into its making. That the movie made a profound impact in Colombia, where it premiered, testifies strongly to its authenticity. The story is powerful and horrible and realistic, but one can also perceive a hopeful optimism in it by the end.

MARIA FULL OF GRACE is not always an easy film to watch, and some of the more disturbing images are bound to linger on the mind longer than one might wish.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars Please no hard coded subtitles!
I returned this bluray. It had hard coded english subtitles . . subtitles that are in the video itsself and cannot be turned off. Read more
Published 16 days ago by David Austin
5.0 out of 5 stars Welcome to Colombia Where Life Is Cheap and Death Is Expensive
This film directed by Joshua Marston tells the tragic story of young women known as mules who deliver drugs to the USA in their stomachs.
Published 1 month ago by Zarathustra
5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome
I first seen this Movie on IMC, a few years ago.
I loved this movie so much I recommend it to everyone. I think I've seen it over 50 times, so far. I just had to buy it. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Raiderette-Chikita
4.0 out of 5 stars Good movie.
Shipping was really fast. Would purchase from this vendor again. I have a Colombian fiance, and wanted to take a little peak into what alot of Colombians get involved with in order... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Peter Suarez
4.0 out of 5 stars Good Movie, But...
The storyline was great, and although I'm not a fan of subtitles, the movie held my interest. I thought the storyline was well played-out; however I felt the movie ended somewhat... Read more
Published 4 months ago by DMV Art Lover
4.0 out of 5 stars AN "INDY" (IN SPANISH) ABOUT DRUG "MULES" CARRYING DRUGS FROM...
REALLY PRETTY SAD. Young women with no future try and find a way out of poverty by ingesting drugs and smuggling them from Columbia to the U.S. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Holly
5.0 out of 5 stars Great movie
The actors in the movie performed very well. The reason why it is such a great movie, is because it can become a reality for some.
Published 6 months ago by may616
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Movie
This movie was very good. I saw it before so I wanted to own a copy. I purchased a used DVD. It was in perfect condition. I do recommend this movie :o)
Published 7 months ago by jessy
5.0 out of 5 stars Gut-wrenching but amazing film
I love watching foreign films but I am always a little skeptical about the authenticity of it. I think this film really portrays the drug dealing and injustices that happen in... Read more
Published 7 months ago by odballcyn
5.0 out of 5 stars Great film
Most Americans base their perception about other countries & the daily lives of their citizens on what they here through the media. Read more
Published 12 months ago by abcgator
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Is this movie in Spanish with subtitles, or is it dubbed in English?
This is in Spanish 5.1 and Spanish 2.0 original language.

Subtitles are in Spanish, English, and French.
Jun 5, 2008 by R. Mercedes Parker |  See all 3 posts
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