Maria (2019 film)

Maria is a 2019 Filipino action film directed by Pedring Lopez and written by Pedring Lopez and Yz Carbonell. The plot revolves around Maria (Cristine Reyes), a former hired assassin who now lives a happy home life. But things are about to change when she is spotted by someone from her past.[1][2][3][4][5]

Maria
Theatrical release poster
Directed byPedring A. Lopez
Produced by
  • Vic del Rosario
  • Kelly Uy
Written byPedring A. Lopez
Screenplay byYz Carbonell
Rex Lopez
StarringCristine Reyes
Germaine De Leon
KC Montero
Music byJessie Lasaten
CinematographyPao Orendain
Edited byJason Cahapay
Production
company
Distributed by
Release date
  • March 27, 2019 (2019-03-27)
Running time
90 minutes
CountryPhilippines
LanguageFilipino
English

The film was produced by Viva Films in partnership with streaming site Netflix. It was released in theaters nationwide on March 27, 2019.

Premise

Maria (Cristine Reyes) is a former hired assassin who now lives a happy home life. But things turn for the worse when her former boyfriend and partner-in-crime, Kaleb (Ivan Padilla), finds her and tries to turn her over to her former self again.[1][2]

Plot

The movie starts off with Maria going ham infiltrating a mansion and killing everyone inside. The very end of that shows a mother and her child crying and blacks out to the sound of a gunshot.

Fast forward to the present, Maria wakes up next to her Husband Bert, gives him a kiss, gets dressed and goes to check on her daughter, Min-Min. She then makes breakfast for her family and her husband comes in saying he’s going to skip breakfast to go to a meeting with Governor Villanueva. She tells him that all politicians are the same and that he should be having breakfast instead. Min-Min comes into the kitchen and answers her mother that breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

Ricardo de la Vega is sitting in his office watching a press conference of Governor Villanueva. A reporter asks him about his anti-drug campaign and his partner Ricardo to which he says Ricardo has never been my partner and one he’s elected they’ll get justice. Ricardo yells at the tv that he put him in that position and one of his men comes in saying he has a present for him. He gets into the warehouse where there are two men strung up and bloody. He makes a speech about loyalty and introduces Kaleb and Victor and then calls out the real traitor – the man who said he had a present for him. He beats him with a bat then has two of his female agents shoot the men who were strung up. He tells Kaleb and Victor that Governor Villanueva is making too much noise and that he needs to be taken care of. He orders Kaleb to take care of it, which upsets Victor. He asks Ricardo why he allows Kaleb to mess things up and Ricardo responds: I call the shots.

Maria goes to pick Min-Min up from school and calls Bert and asks him to come home early to eat with them. They have dinner together and they joke that dinner is very good.

After dinner Bert and Maria are watching Governor Villanueva on TV with Min-Min sleeping in their lap. Bert tells her that he thinks the governor is really a good guy and Maria responds sarcastically that of course he is. When he gets upset, she tells him she’s just kidding, and they hold hands.

At the rally for Villanueva, one of Ricardo’s men is reporting about the situation of the security being tight. Meanwhile Bert is standing outside with a Governor Villanueva T-shirt handing out flyers and shaking hands. Maria goes to get Min-Min from talking to a police officer and the man takes a picture of her. He sends the pictures to Kaleb and he immediately recognizes Maria and heads over to the rally to find her, but she has already left.

Back at home, Bert is watching the governor on the tv again and Maria turns it off. They get into an argument about him paying more attention to the governor than to his own family.

At the docks, Victor and his men are torturing a man to get information. He calls Kaleb to ask how it’s going and tells him he’s going to send men over, but Kaleb tells him no and hangs up on him. Ricardo walks in and asks if the man has said anything. Victor shoots the man in the head and tells him no.

Kaleb practices sparring with his trainer and has a flashback with his girlfriend Miru where she tells him that she doesn’t want to kill anymore. He tells her that they have one more mission and that afterwards he would talk to Ricardo. In the present Kaleb subdues his trainer, knocking him out and tells his bodyguards to clean up the mess.

The next morning Maria is having breakfast with her family and Bert tells her that he wasn’t going to go to see the governor that day, and Maria responds that she would cook them a good dinner because he wasn’t able to see the governor the day before.

Kaleb calls Victor’s men together and tells Miru to take care of the governor while he takes care of something else. He tells the men that he sent them a picture of Maria’s family and that he wants them to find them and bring them to him. Directly after, Kaleb's men go and kidnap Leo and torture him into telling him where Maria lives.

Some of Kaleb’s men see Maria in a market place and recognize her. They start to follow her then she starts to run. They chase her and she defends herself, picking them off quickly, and then hurries home. She runs inside and tells her husband Bert and Min-Min to pack, and her husband starts asking what was wrong when the doorbell rings. She tells him not to answer it but he goes and Leo is at the door. He says I’m sorry then is immediately shot by Kaleb. He walks in with a few men and one man come in from the back. She knocks out the man and shoots him, but Kaleb puts a gun to her husband’s head and tells her to put the gun down. He calls her Lilly. After a few seconds of pondering she puts the gun down. One of the men separates her and her daughter, and when she runs towards her father Kaleb shoots her in the face. Her father grabs her and starts crying and Kaleb puts a gun to his neck.

The film then flashes back to the scene at the beginning of the film. Lily had refused to kill the lady and her daughter and another man was about to do it, but she shot him in the head, shot Kaleb in the knee and ran off with the girl and her mother.

Back to the present she fights to get away from the men and her husband pushes away from Kaleb as well and fights him. Bert, seeing more men coming from the back entrance, shoves Kaleb away and gets shot while blocking Maria from their bullets. Maria kills all of the assassins but Kaleb who gets dragged out by a goon into a car, where it was revealed that he was wearing a bullet proof vest. He calls Ricardo who asks is it done and tells him that they have bigger problems because Lilly is alive and everyone else is dead. He then calls Miru and tells her to fall back. Maria cries with Min Min in her arms then kisses her dead husband on the forehead, grabs her knives then gets on a train.

On the train she plays with a necklace that the little girl she saved gave her. She gets off the train and starts to walk towards a building with a restaurant. She goes to the back of the restaurant where the chairs are stacked and goes to a man sitting in the back booth. He starts to tell her that he is retired while he is reading a newspaper, but she puts the newspaper down and then he is shocked to see the woman he knows as Lilly. She calls him Sir Greg and asks for a place to stay. He tells her to go to a hotel and he doesn’t want anything to do with this.

The next scene shows the aftermath of what happened at her house. There are newspersons there calling it a massacre and they said that all they know is that a father and daughter are dead. Victor is there posing as a police agent. He calls Ricardo and tells him that some of the guys can be identified as his men. He tells him to fix it or else.

Sir Greg decides to help Maria and is patching up a wound on her back. He asks her isn’t she supposed to be dead. She responds Lilly is. She tells him that she’s going to kill Kaleb. He tells her nothing good will come from revenge and to get away and have another family. She tells him that Kaleb murdered her family, and he tells her she can stay with him.

Back at Ricardo’s compound he has a drink with victor and talks about Lilly still being alive. He says he’s going to cancel the trip, but Victor tells him no, take it, I’ll handle this. Ricardo looks worried and annoyed but keeps drinking.

Kaleb meets up with his girlfriend Miru, gives her a picture of Maria and tells her to finish her off. She asks who she is, and he just responds that she was an operative like her. He tells her that she’s at Old man Greg’s place, but not to touch him because they have an agreement with him.

She goes to Greg's place and walks in to see him. He lets her know they have an agreement and sends one of his men on her. A fight scene ensues where she knocks out Bogart and she goes on her way.

Meanwhile, Maria has infiltrated a drug packing factory of Ricardo’s and takes out the guards and the chemists with only her knives. She sets the building on fire in order to disrupt his production and then showers off the blood. During the shower, she has a flashback of going to the park with Bert and Min-Min.

After she showers Greg comes to tell her that she has caused some trouble and that she shouldn’t apologize to him but to Bogart. She reminds him to call her Maria and he responds he knows her as Lilly. She asks if anything good can happen to her anymore. He responds that they should be numb to death, but he hated being the one to have to put her down after Ricardo’s gang put a bounty on her. During a flashback it is revealed that they were about to square down gun to gun, but he gave her pills to take to give her an easy death. He took her to Kaleb to go show him her body. Back in the present he tells her that she was the reason he retired, and to never think that no good could happen to her because as long as she was breathing, she had an opportunity to find happiness. She asks him for equipment. Victor goes to Kaleb and tells him he’s taking over because the factory is in ashes. Kaleb pulls a gun on Victor and tells him, he’s going to kill him. Victor takes the gun and puts it to his forehead and tells him to pull the trigger, but he can’t do it. Kaleb screams at Victor I’m going to kill you as he walks out.

Maria is sitting in the restaurant watching footage of the burning factory and Sir Greg walks in and says you’re famous. He tells her to follow him. He takes her to the back where all of his weapons are and tells her that she can take anything because no one is going to dare to come after him because of all the assassins he trained. She picks up a knife and tells him she’s also going to need a dress. Maria walks into a nightclub wearing the new dress and locks eyes with Miru. She walks into the restroom and Miru follows shortly after and two of Kaleb's men block the entrance. They argue briefly over which one of them is better then begin to fight. The fight ends with Maria bashing Miru’s head into the corner of the vanity then digging her heel into her skull, killing her. The men hear this and become concerned, rushing into the bathroom. Maria quickly disarms one of them and shoots them both. She walks out of the bathroom, encounters a few more men, easily dispatches them then heads upstairs. She sits down with the club manager on a couch and asks where Kaleb is. He gives her a phone where she can contact and him and as she walks away he says give my regards to your family. She put her knife to his throat, forced him to eat a handful of drugs, then threw all of the money inside of a duffel bag over to the people in the club.

Ricardo sits down with Victor and asks him to take out Governor Villanueva. When he asks about Lilly, Ricardo says to let Kaleb take care of her. Victor starts to protest, but Ricardo slams his hand down on the desk and tells him he will never be head of this family and to work on the governor.

Back at the bar, Greg asks how it went last night with Maria, and he tells her that it’s not too late for her and that he’ll give her money to start over. Their talk is interrupted by a call from Kaleb telling her to meet him that night at the docks. Kaleb also calls Victor and tells him to go to the docks as well. He tells Wednesday to get everyone ready and that there are to be no survivors – not even Kaleb.

Wednesday shows up at the docks and Kaleb asks where Victor is. Maria shows up at the docks as well in tactical gear, takes out a guy to get his gun and stealthily makes her way around the docks. Wednesday hears the gunshots and tells her men to get into position to which Kaleb angrily says I make the decisions and I say stand down. Maria continues to take down his men. Wednesday challenges him and he finally lets her get into position. He asks what they’re waiting for, and her men start firing on the office with Kaleb still inside, killing some of his bodyguards. Greg appears with a sniper rifle and starts to take down Victor’s men as they pull up. Victor calls Greg and tries to tell him that he violated the deal, but Greg insists that because he didn’t touch Victor the agreement is still intact and he’s just trying to even the odds. Maria continues to approach the docks office while the remaining two of Kaleb’s bodyguards cover him from Victor’s men long enough for him to get away. Maria catches up to Kaleb, however, and the two spar while he taunts her. Maria eventually gets the upper hand and he tells her she can’t escape death; she is death. She says I know right before she slits his throat.

Later on, Kaleb’s body is on a slab with Victor and Ricardo standing over him. Ricardo tells Victor to avenge his brother.

Back at the bar, Greg gives Maria a bag full of cash and shares one last drink with her in silence. The movie ends with them sitting side by side locking eyes.

Cast

References
  1. "Maria (2019) Review". City on Fire. Retrieved June 27, 2019.
  2. "Movie review: Cristine Reyes exceeds expectations in action-packed 'Maria'". ABS CBN. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  3. ‘Maria’ review: Engrossing actioner. Rappler. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  4. ‘Maria’ review: Cristine Reyes astounds in a well-executed badass film. Cinema Bravo. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  5. Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Maria’ on Netflix, a Pseudo-Stylish Filipino Action Movie in Which a Lady Assassin Wants Revenge. Decider. Retrieved August 26, 2019.
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