Williamsburg writer-director Joshua Marston
is opening a lot of eyes these days to the softer side of drug
smuggling.
While Americans are familiar with more militant phrases like
"war on drugs," the media rarely provides a glimpse
into the social or financial variables that might tempt a person
to be a part of the drug trade.
In his first feature film, "Maria Full of Grace," which
is being released in theaters this month, Marston tells the tautly
paced story of an appealing, feisty, 17-year-old girl who yearns
for a way out of her sweatshop-like job in a flower plantation
and cramped home which she shares with four generations of her
family.
Marston, 35, told GO Brooklyn this week that he was inspired
to make the film after he heard a first-hand account of drug
smuggling from a Colombian woman in the United States who had
risked her freedom and her life for the big money that becoming
a drug "mule" promises.
"Actually, I thought, ’This is quite a compelling story,’
and I started thinking about it, taking notes and researching.
Then I wrote my first draft," said Marston. He said the
movie was not just influenced by that one woman’s tale, but by
those told by many Colombians who have swallowed pellets of heroine
in order to sneak them through customs.
He said the journey from the first draft of the script to final
cut was five long years. Over that time the writer-director went
to the same great lengths that a documentary filmmaker might
attempt in order to make his utterly engrossing, realistic fiction
film.
"I had a lot of conversations over time," he said.
"I spoke to people in jail here and in South America. I
also spent a bit of time in JFK [International Airport in Queens]
with customs inspectors and watching them work."
A harrowing moment in the film takes place in JFK, when Maria,
played by Catalina Sandino Moreno, is questioned by customs inspectors
who pressure her to allow them to X-ray her torso. The game of
chicken is excruciating to watch because the audience knows that
Maria’s belly is uncomfortably full of 62 large pellets filled
with heroin that could leak and kill her – not to mention her
unborn child.
While this interrogation and search may be dehumanizing, it’s
just the latest in a series of many humiliations that the young
girl has already suffered. Moreno delivers a sympathetic performance
that hinges on her inherent decency and commitment to her family
that makes this risky venture necessary.
In February, Moreno won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the
Berlin Film Festival, for her performance in this film.
To add to the realism of "Maria Full of Grace," Marston
wrote the script in Spanish, which he claims is his fourth language.
He even encouraged the Colombian cast to collaborate with him
on the script.
"I’m not, nor have I ever been, a Colombian 17-year-old
girl," said the ever-serious, soft-spoken Marston. "I
knew I would be reliant on my actors to fill in a lot of blanks
in the script in terms of characters, as well as how they were
talking. That’s the reason why I cast them. Aside from being
good actors, they had their own background as Colombians, and
the region where the characters were from, and they could draw
from that knowledge."
Marston’s insistence on Spanish with English subtitles was turned
down by many studios before HBO saw the script. The cable company
is distributing the film with Fine Line Features, and it seems
their intuition was right because the film won the Dramatic Audience
Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
"When I showed up at Sundance, I had never shown the finished
film to anyone, and I was now screening it for 1,200 people –
and it was terrifying," recalled Marston. "Normally
the Audience Award is given to a comedy or a feel-good movie,
so the idea that it went to a difficult, dramatic film was especially
gratifying."
In addition to being filmed on location in Ecuador (in lieu of
Colombia, which was not practical in the fall of 2001 because
of political instability and violence), the film has scenes in
Jackson Heights, Queens, a neighborhood with a large population
of Colombian immigrants. It’s there that Maria meets Don Fernando,
a travel agent who acts as an advisor for the community’s new
arrivals and a liaison with local officials. Maria needs his
help to find another drug mule that she believes to be murdered.
Marston wrote this character into the script after meeting Orlando
Tobon, "The Mayor of Little Colombia," who came to
play Don Fernando and be an associate producer on the film. Don
Fernando is instrumental in helping her efforts on behalf of
the missing courier. In reality, Tobon has repatriated the bodies
of 400 Colombian drug mules who died in their journeys to America.
"That was really in the late ’80s and ’90s, at the height
of the smuggling," explained Marston. "But I believe
he just did another one just last week He’s very open to the
subject and felt very passionate about it. He was generous enough
to let me sit in his office and observe."
The gritty realism and tension in the film is also a product
of director of photography Jim Denault’s handheld camerawork.
"Like most director-DP relationships, we watched a lot of
films together and the key phrases that came up over and over
again for us were ’immediate’ or ’organic,’" said Marston.
"The film should feel authentic and real. One film that
was a reference for us, ’Our Song,’ was also shot by Jim."
It’s clear that in making "Maria Full of Grace," Marston
felt a responsibility to the many Colombians who shared their
personal, painful stories with him.
"The enjoyment of this work is that it reaches people and
touches them and affects them," he said. He recalled a 60-year-old
Colombian man who was watching a scene being shot from a hallway.
"He said, ’I completely relate to what that character is
saying. Thank you,’" said Marston. "He was thanking
me for making this film. It was a very moving moment for me to
know I was getting everything right."
"Maria Full of Grace," directed
by Joshua Marston, opens at the Cobble Hill Cinemas [265 Court
St. at Douglass Street in Cobble Hill, (718) 596-9113] on July
30. Mondays through Fridays before 5 pm; Saturdays and Sundays
prior to 2 pm; and all-day Tuesdays and Thursdays, tickets are
$5. Some restrictions apply. Cobble Hill Cinemas accepts MasterCard
and Visa. Check listings for other theaters.
