Sabor tropical

Travel, particularly to Latin America, is of great interest to me. After reading previous reviews, I was looking forward to seeing Sabor Tropical, although there was an element throughout the reviews that was vaguely troubling to me. After watching the "director's cut", I feel compelled to write a review that will spare others from an awful waste of time and money. First, most of the movie is presented as footage from a hand held video camera--the cinematography is therefore terrible. The perspective of Panama is street scenes behind one of the characters that could have been shot in Newark, New Jersey, or out of a moving car window of sky and fields that could have been in Iowa. The scenes of Carnival were shot at night with a voice over introduction that sounded like it was being read from a travel brochure. Second, the "star" is a narcissistic exhibitionist (to be kind) who is periodically referred to in the movie as resembling Colin Ferrel or James Dean--he doesn't. Finally, production values, story line, writing, acting, and directing are among some the the worst I've ever seen. Spare yourself.

I enjoyed this movie, it had a lot of interesting twists to it. Very colorful and informative.It's a suspenseful and captivating journey with a young man's visit to an unfamiliar country and his experiences along the way.The story was a roller coaster ride of emotions.The characters were interesting and often not what you would expect.The scenes were real and unfiltered showing the heart and soul of Panama. Which made for an interesting story, not very predictable.I would have liked to have seen more background on the main character learned more history on him.Definitely will checkout future films from the young lead actor.Loved the previous works from the director Jorge Ameer. I would recommend this movie if you are captivated by the unexpected.

How did this movie ever get labeled as a thriller? I must have fallen asleep during those thriller sequences. In other words, there are no thrilling parts, no suspenseful parts and not a mystery to be found. Unless you try to count the online event as the mystery. It is not a mystery but an unfortunate occurrence that anyone using the internet should be wise to. The movie is nothing more than a boring rendition of a Panamanian travelogue with some repulsive violence near the end.

If you're interested in seeing the lead, Matthew Leitch, in various states of undress or nakedness, then the movie does provide that. Otherwise, good luck at finding anything else in the movie that's worth the wasting of your time.

I heard about this film in the Panamanian media because there was scandal surrounding its release. I recently purchased the DVD not knowing what to expect. I live in Panama City but I'm from the town where this film was shot, Las Tablas, so I was compelled to see what all this film was is all about. I was very pleasantly surprise because I was proud to see both Panama and the carnival well represented here. If you have never been to the Carnival of Las Tablas, this would be a good film to watch to be familiar with it. the story is documentary style. The story follows the journey of a reporter who comes to Panama to do a video diary of his experience at carnival. He soon gets involved in the hype of the festivities and sooner than later ends up with some interesting experiences along the way. The film builds to a scandalous ending that is very unexpected and powerful. It leaves you wondering what happened and why. The film is very good yet very, very violent towards the ending but satisfying. If you are looking to experience the high energy and festivities of one of Panama's and Latin America's most popular events with an open mind and something different from the usual, you will find Sabor Tropical an fun inde movie to watch.

As I watched Sabor, the first thing that came to mind is oh my god, that Matthew Leitch is one hot actor. His performance was riveting. I found the documentary style was fascinating. I found the carnival in Panama to be colorful and lively specially because of the high energy an colorful costumes. The ending was kinda shocking and amazing... I thought it was genius. I recommend this film because it very original and thought provoking. At first I wasn't so crazy about the colombian guy but as I thought about it his performance was very realistic. His character was believable as he was not a Hollywood type actor. I thought the story was so realistic you could not tell what was scripted and what was not. As I watched it on DVD, I would have really liked to have seen it on the big screen for it think it would have had a bigger impact. Some movies you just have to see them on the big screen and that's my preferred way I would have liked to have seen this.