Max Payne 3 - Synopsis - Plot

Plot

14 years has passed since Max Payne (James McCaffrey) lost his family and 9 years after the previous game, Max Payne has retired from the NYPD, now drowning his sorrows in alcohol and painkillers in his shady apartment in Hoboken, New Jersey. When Max gets into a confrontation at a bar with the son of a local mob boss, Anthony DeMarco, an old acquaintance from his police academy, Raul Passos, intervenes. Raul is seeking Max in order to recruit him as a private security contractor for a job in South America. Max initially refuses his offer, but when he becomes a target for mob hitmen after he kills Tony DeMarco in a bar fight, he agrees to accompany Passos.

Max and Passos arrive in São Paulo, Brazil, where they work for the wealthy and powerful Branco family, made up of three brothers: Rodrigo, a real-estate mogul, Victor, a local politician, and the hard-partying Marcelo. During a party at Rodrigo's penthouse, he and his young wife Fabiana are attacked by a street gang called the Comando Sombra, but Max saves them. Fabiana, her sister Giovanna, and Marcelo are later again targeted at a nightclub by the same gang, who successfully kidnap Fabiana. Max and Passos bring ransom money to the gang at a football stadium, but the deal is thwarted by an outlaw right-wing paramilitary group known as Crachá Preto, who steal the money. Max and Passos decide to raid a Sombra safehouse outside the city to save Fabiana, but the gang escapes with her. As Max and Passos discuss the situation with Rodrigo, Victor, and Armando Becker, the local battalion commander of the special police unit Unidade de Forças Especiais (UFE), the Crachá Preto raid the Branco offices.

Max suspects that somebody is trying to frame the Crachá Preto for the events taking place with the Brancos. Max fights off the Crachá Preto, but returns to Rodrigo's secured offices to find him assassinated. A bomb then explodes in the building, but Max escapes, learning from a dying Crachá Preto that Fabiana is in the Nova Esperança favela, and the raid was meant to kill Max and avenge the deaths of their operatives at the stadium. Realizing the implications, Max stops drinking and shaves his head to disguise himself for another rescue attempt. In the favela, Max runs into an officer named Wilson Da Silva. Da Silva informs him that the Crachá Preto had nefarious links with Rodrigo, who hired them to clear out villages on a piece of land he wished to turn into a retail development. Da Silva thinks UFE and Victor are all connected to Max's predicament.

Max finds Fabiana with Marcelo and Giovanna, who were also kidnapped while trying to pay Fabiana's ransom themselves. Max recklessly attempts to save the trio, but Comando Sombra's leader Serrano executes Fabiana, and escapes with Giovanna and Marcelo in the ensuing standoff. As Max gives chase, the UFE raids the favela; he witnesses the Crachá Preto and UFE exchanging money for those who were arrested in the raids. Max finds Marcelo and Giovanna in the hands of the Crachá Preto's second-in-command Milo Rego. Marcelo is killed by necklacing in front of Max, and Max kills Milo and saves Giovanna, who explains that this was done to give the UFE an excuse to raid the area. As Max and Giovanna are running, he learns that she is pregnant. Passos arrives in a helicopter, but flees with Giovanna and abandons Max, who is saved by Da Silva.

Da Silva tells Max that he did a background check on Passos and found that Passos was on Victor's payroll, until he hired Max. Da Silva asks Max what happened in Panama. A flashback shows Max and Passos watching Marcelo at a yacht party. Max is heavily intoxicated and passes out. He wakes up to find the boat in a lock in the Panama Canal and swarmed by Panamanian soldiers. He escapes the yacht and finds Marcelo and Passos trying to drive away with the unknown cargo. It hits Max that he was recruited by Passos to be the "fall guy" for whatever illicit activity the Brancos were involved in. Da Silva deduces that Passos and Victor set him up, so Victor would gain access to his brother's wealth and garner sympathy for elections. Da Silva informs Max about a rundown building, the Imperial Palace Hotel, where the Crachá Preto and UFE are seen entering with prisoners, yet none leave. Max discovers it is the base for a black market organ theft ring and corrupt UFE officers were being paid to deliver the detainees for organ harvesting.

Max finds a captive Serrano being prepared for harvesting and frees him, allowing him to take revenge on the surgeon performing the harvests. Max sets explosives to destroy the entire complex, and Passos kills Crachá Preto leader Álvaro Neves to save Max. Max discovers Passos was unaware of the plan to set him up. He forgives Passos, who leaves Brazil with Giovanna, asking Max to get over his past and move on. Da Silva now devises a plan for Max, since Da Silva himself cannot take any action. Max surrenders in the police station in order to find incriminating evidence linking the UFE, Crachá Preto and Victor. Max finds the surveillance CD stolen from Rodrigo's office and learns the identity of his assassin, a UFE operative. Max avenges Rodrigo's murder and confronts Becker. Victor holds him at gunpoint and explains to Max that he wanted more money from his brother for his political campaign: he told the Crachá Preto to ambush the money exchange at the stadium, which went toward funding the organ harvesting ring, the profits of which helped fund his campaign.

Victor and Becker escape to the airport with Max in pursuit. After an intense shootout, Max arrives at the hangar where Becker and Victor are preparing to board a jet. Becker tries to use a grenade launcher to kill Max, but ends up burning himself and losing his left arm when Max shoots one of the fired grenades. Max then grabs the grenade launcher and, with Da Silva's help, uses it to disable Victor's plane. Da Silva persuades Max to spare Victor so he will answer for the crimes he committed.

A week later, Max watches the news at a bar, on a beach in Bahia. Becker's UFE battalion has been disbanded indefinitely due to their ties to the organ harvesting ring, while Victor is found hanged in his cell, although the circumstances are unclear. Max leaves the bar and walks onto the beach into the sunset.