In the film Karma, Rhen Escaño plays Angel, an ace assassin who is forever scarred by her father’s murder. Angel was eight years old when her father was brutally killed in front of her, and she grew up trying to protect those who are being oppressed. It came to a point where she accidentally killed a man who was attempting to rob a father and his child.

With the help of her godfather, the provincial kingpin called “Chief,” Angel was not sent to prison, but she became part of his covert assassin organization, which only targets society’s dregs. However, in her latest mission, the young daughter of her target witnessed her crime. Angel is unable to remove from her mind the image of the girl holding her father’s lifeless body in her arms. Her remorse gets even stronger when she learns that the man she killed was not a drug pusher, but an undercover police officer.

This discovery leads to more disturbing revelations about her godfather, the true nature of their organization, and the truth behind her father’s death. Now, there’s no stopping her from taking down the real culprit.

Rhen Escaño returns to the core if her preparations for the movie that physically challenged her capabilities.

“Unang una po our director made sure na nakapag action training po ako dahil iyun ang una kailangan gawin. Kailangan maging malakas ako physically dahil hindi ako nagwo work out hindi ako physically fit. Mahaba ang naging preparation, nag gun firing kami so first time ko rin makahawak ng baril at natakot ako ng time na ‘yun (our director made sure that I underwent training for my action scenes. I needed to learn the right techniques and how to handle a real gun),” Escaño said.

Karma pairs Escaño with Sid Lucero, who plays the role of Rommel, an ex-academician turned assassin. Rommel has had quite a temper since he was young. After a deadly encounter with a gang, Chief recruits him into his organization. Rommel and Angel become partners, treating each other like siblings. Though he is an efficient hitman, Rommel has never really liked this job and hopes to retire as soon as possible. Chief agrees to his retirement on one condition: that he get rid of Angel who Chief now sees as a liability to their organization because of all the things she’s found out.

Lucero, meanwhile, shared his character in the movie and some interesting personal stories of anger management that happened years ago.

“May misunderstanding kami ng girlfriend ko. Tapos every car from my car to the bar butas lahat ng tires nun hindi ko naman siya (girlfriend) masaksak so ‘yung tires na lang. Seryoso, it was really bad, dati pa ito. This was long time ago. There’s also this one time when I was having a fight with my girlfriend and I needed to pee. I went to this gas station and then this guy approached and asked, ‘pwede pa picture?’ I punched him and his eyeballs burst. I had to attend an anger management session (This happened years ago when my girlfriend at the time and I had a misunderstanding. The tires of all the cars parked, leading to bar were flat. There was also an incident when I punched someone who was only asking if he could have a picture with me),” he said.

Aside from this movie, Escaño and Lucero are also seen together in the TV series directed by Carlo J. Caparas’ Lumuhod Ka sa Lupa currently airing on TV5.

To prepare for her role, Escaño took fight and gun training, clips of which she shared on her official social media accounts.

Her caption read, “Will never forget ilang beses akong umiyak kase akala ko ‘di ko kaya (how many times I cried out in frustration because I thought I couldn’t do it).”

Fans of Rhen Escaño who first saw her as a sexy star are in for a treat as she has grown as an actress, taking on a very challenging role in the action genre.

The role of Chief is played by Roi Vinzon. Karma also stars Krista Miller as Keana, Chief’s concubine; Paolo Paraiso, Leandro Baldemor and Mon Confiado.

Produced by Viva Films at Happy Infinite, Karma opens 19 June in cinemas nationwide.