Turistas (Unrated Edition)

Filmmakers have tried to touch rock bottom in horror and disgust in the last few years, each one vying to be the most original and shocking. Just when Hostel made you think you couldn't go any lower, along comes Turistas. I know what vivisection is but never saw it portrayed on film before. It was admittedly shocking, and well-done (within a very narrow definition of that term). We even get the treat of listening to the evil doctor expounding a Marxist analysis of core and periphery states while pulling the vital organs out of the gasping, pleading victim.

But a good horror movie is more than one scene, or even a couple of other adequate ones. Overall, the movie just doesn't cut it. You've got the problems other reviewers have noted, such as the one-dimensional characters, and the script problem of "We were drugged and robbed last night, and left without money or ID. After walking for hours though the jungle, being led by someone we don't know, why don't we stop and go swimming at a waterfall!" I also note that a philanthropic doctor who cuts out vital organs to help the poor is not the kind of person who would stab a person in the eye with a palito de churrasquinho.

Also, I think I just don't have patience for these types of movies anymore. They're so formulaic: a group of adolescents goes to a remote location, where they get picked off one by one until the ending counter-attack. Throw in some nice naked female flesh to keep the interest up. Been there, done that.

These movies also take too long to get going. Maybe if it's your first horror movie, the windup is worth something. But after your first horror movie, the delivery takes precedence.

this movie was just plain bad. bad story. bad "gore". bad everything. don't waste your money or your time watching this.

This is a bad bad movie. It doesn't even make sense. For one thing, after the bus flips over a mountain in the beginning of the film and all the passengers barely escape, they stand around watching the bus roll off the cliff. Five minutes later they seem to forget that incident took place. Now I don't know about you, but if that happened to me, I'd be spending the rest of my day (and life) feeling extremely fortunate I escaped from the bus in time.

After that scene is over, the next 30 minutes of film is a waste of time. It's nothing but a big party scene on a beach where a bunch of young adults are standing around talking and playing typical beach games. No effort at all was involved to bring any kind of tension to this supposed "horror" movie. It was just one big party scene.

After a while, a crazy guy decides he wants to cut open the bodies of the people he trapped and tied up, and steal their organs while they are awake. Okay, that's pretty uncomfortable, but it wasn't enough to save the movie, because these scary moments only happen a couple times. The action scenes at the end involving the people trying to run away from the guy and his friends WOULD have been cool had it not taken place at night, when we can't see what's going on. Yeah, lots of action is taking place, but it was too dark to see. You were basically staring at a dark screen guessing who was getting attacked. I was actually wrong at first when I thought the main bad guy was being killed off, only for a lookalike to appear a few moments later. Obviously it wasn't the same guy.

The underwater swimming moments were horrible as well. Couldn't see anything. The joke at the end about choosing either a bus or airplane to travel was out of place and unnecessary. Bad movie.

There seems to be a lot of strange people who do the reviews on Amazon that just look for the gore and little plot - as per the likes of "Hostel" etc .

This film is not a gore fest - it is in the tradition of a good thriller with a good storyline . The tension starts from the very beginning of the film - you get to know the main characters very quickly and all that happens to them makes a lot of sense a lot of backpackers the world over who travel to 3rd world destinations will testify to .

The acting is excellent , the script fine , the location unusual , the thrills non stop , and the horror in adequate doses to make the film believable .

Don't judge this film by a few reviews on here including Amazon's own which is fairly inaccurate (which makes me believe that the Amazon reviewer has'nt actually watched the movie but is quoting from other references). As per the reviews i read on "Vacancy" recently which were also very unfair and inacccurate by reviewers who were wantinga cheap B movie gore fest - this film is of a high quality in all aspects - RECOMMENDED to keep you on the edge of your seat from start to finish - good traditional bloody thriller !!

After watching 'Hostel' and HATING that movie and giving it away...I found this movie MUCH better. It was worth the few dollars.
Turistas left a few things to your own imagination and left you thinking more
like you actually had somewhat of a brain. There was more actual 'writing' in it than Hostel.