A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a nefarious past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the Panamanian president and a huge debt. The mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Canal.
If you think the spy-thriller genre has been streamlined and spoofed and subverted until nothing new can be done to it, think again.
– Peter Rainer,
New York Magazine/Vulture,
26 Sep 2002
fresh:
Boorman has crafted a witty, classy and richly enjoyable morality play, which skewers the mercenary self-interest behind Anglo-American imperialism almost as an afterthought.