Maria Full of Grace

Composite Score: 84.03

Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Guilied Lopez, Orlando Tobón, Yenny Paola Vega, Wilson Guerrero, Johanna Andrea Mora, Jhon Álex Toro, Jaime Osorio Gómez, and Patricia Rae

Director: Joshua Marston

Writer: Joshua Marston

Genres: Crime, Drama, Coming-of-Age

MPAA Rating: R for drug content and language

Box Office: $12.59 million worldwide

Why should you Watch This Film?

                Maria Full of Grace is Joshua Marston’s film about a Colombian teenager who decides to become a drug mule after becoming pregnant and losing her job working at a local flower plantation. The film follows Maria (Catalina Sandino Moreno) as she develops from a rebellious seventeen-year-old working at a flower plantation to an expectant teen mother hoping for a fresh start in the United States. The film’s intimate look at poverty and the systems that keep the poor down, both in Colombia and the U.S., make it a welcome addition to the Greatest Films of All Time. Sandino Moreno’s nomination for Best Actress at the Oscars only serves as the well-deserved cherry on top to the reasons to check out this Spanish-language film.

Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?

                Maria Full of Grace is a deeply subtle film, dominated by subtle performances, subtle references to poverty systems, subtle hints at character growth, and subtle indications of threat. While this subtlety sets the film apart from most other films in its subgenre of drug trafficking films/teenage mother films, it makes the film fall a little bit flat by the ending. Every subtlety feels intentional and is well done, but the all-encompassing nature of the subtlety forces the audience to deeply invest in characters and situations that have not been fully shared with them. On the one hand, it gives the film a stark sense of realistic voyeurism, like we are on the outside looking in at a few days in Maria’s life, but on the other, it makes it hard to become fully invested in the message beyond her story. If it was just her performance, I think the film would better resonate with the audience. As it stands, Catalina Sandino Moreno carries the film, and I care much more about her (fictional) story than I do about the realistic situations that she experiences because the whole thing is the same note.

So wait, why should you Watch This Film?

                Catalina Sandino Moreno is the reason to watch Maria Full of Grace. The actress’s Academy Award nomination is no fluke – she brought this film to a level of greatness that its story and content might otherwise have never reached. I don’t know whether it was her performance or intentional decisions by the hair and makeup department, but her transformation from the start to the end of this film is wild to behold (still subtle, but brilliant). The way she is able to capture the essence of a rebellious teen at the start of the film and an independent woman hoping for a better life for herself and her child at the end of the film while putting that transition (physical and emotional) on display in the intervening scenes is on par with some of the greatest performances I’ve ever seen. She steps into the role of Maria and owns it, commanding every scene like a veteran actress with many films under her belt, not a rookie actress with no credits yet to her name. It truly is an all-time great performance.

                Catalina Sandino Moreno’s powerful and dynamic leading performance carries Maria Full of Grace to a place of greatness, worthy of its recognition as one of the Greatest Films of All Time. The film’s insistence on keeping its themes less out in the open might lessen its impact somewhat, but that does nothing to diminish the work done by Sandino Moreno as the film’s lead. This film is currently streaming on HBO Max if you’re looking to watch it in the near future.