Left to Die (2012)

You won't be disappointed!

That was an excellent one.

A lot more amusing than I thought it would be.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

I am not from Ecuador, so cannot speak about its history, country or people, but I can tell you about this film and (US) films and programmes in general. If you want to a story and to get a feel of what happened to the Chase family, then it's worth the watch. This is a dramatisation of a story that actually happened, it will not be completely accurate if you want accuracy, but you get a good sense of what happened.Sandra Chase was in a prison and if you know anything about prisons, most prisons are not pleasant places to be in no MATTER what country they are in. All prisons have their own rules. The warden and guards rules and then the prisoners' rules. I don't think she was in a minimum security prison either. She was not in the West as well and it was in the 1990s, where South American countries were seriously trying to reform the judicial system. So prisons were probably no bed of roses. Prisons are not supposed to be holiday camps after all. I wrote a whole long list of programmes and films to explain this going back to Birth of a Nation (1915) to World Trade Center (2006) as examples of how film makers manipulated things and many films in between (this information was removed as it may have contained spoilers and makes this review even longer); but basically stories can be added to or characters added for dramatic effect and even changed; even though historians, focus groups, action groups, individuals and more object to the unrealistic portrayals. This has always been done and always will be done most likely, by American TV & film makers as well as others. As for things like the prison scenes, they were tame in my opinion from most other film and TV shows. So, back to the story, here is where a previous poster did no one any favours by not watching the film till the end. Some of it addressing what was said in another review. At the end of the film are two important pieces of information including a history changing one which is probably why this film was made in the first place! One shows you exactly what the film has done with one of the actors (and the real people), if you look out for it, dramatic licence used in this case and another about an important fact. But the film makers are not there to tell the finer details, they are there to tell a story! If you want a true pure film and story, you best never watch a film or TV series again (as they will all have things added or taken away), unless it's a history programme, documentary or the news. This film told a story and you get to see it. It's a drama after all and if nothing else, it should teach everyone, to really know who they are travelling with and always keep an eye on your luggage! I suggest you watch the film for yourself and, to the end, and then make up your own mind!

Very-well-acted drama based on the jailing of an American tourist on trumped-up drug charges in Ecuador.Barbara Hershey is convincing as a woman from Hollywood, Fla., who takes her first trip outside of the US only to get thrown into brutal, filthy El Inca prison, where the guards are sexual predators and inmates act as enforcers.Rachel Leigh Cook excels as Chase's daughter, who suffers a psychological imprisonment of her own knowing how her mother suffers in a sordid place in which she can't speak the language, lacks treatment for her scleroderma, and gets beaten and robbed with regularity.Strong supporting performances come from Colombian actress Rita Bendak, as a cruelly manipulative lifer, and Cristina Marchand playing a nun who risks her own safety to help the Chase family.After many disappointing twists and turns, and 22 months that left her wobbly but still on her feet, Chase won her freedom in 2007, with the help of Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Jacksonville). The movie concludes with what looks like actual footage of the real Chase and her daughter ecstatically embracing at their airport reunion. If you follow the National Geographic Channel series "Locked Up Abroad," this movie may seem like the extended version of a particularly gripping episode. In all, it's a sobering reminder that life can take some unlikely and deeply troubling detours.

This movie depicts the true 1997 story of the anti-American injustices and backwards legal system experienced by 53 yr old "Anti-Drug" Sandra Chase (played by Barbara Hershey), who was held without trial or due process for nearly two years even while terminally ill in an Equadoran Prison (in Quito). Although claiming complete innocence, In real life, Sandra Chase (one of many) experienced beatings by other inmates, deplorable inhuman stench conditions, where prisoners are forced to defecate in the hallways (no toilets in overcrowded small cemented cells), where prison guards who take bribes and payoffs repeatedly brutally rape, beat and mentally abuse American prisoners. To make matters worse, Sandra Chase was denied medical treatment for her scelroderma, a fatal rare disease that attacks the skin and organs and was eventually thrown into a dungeon like atmosphere without food or clean water for 5 days, and when fed, barely surviving on chicken parts and vegetables (not depicted in the movie). "My bible was the only thing they didn't steal," Chase said, "That's the only thing that kept me going".There are scores of other Americans being held in Ecuadoran prisons. Since Rep. Brown's intervention, over 800 prisoners have been released and more than 2,000 are slated to be set free. Still, the backlog of cases creates a system where the innocent are punished more harshly than the guilty and families are incarcerated for a crime of one member. A Typical Situation, Rep. Brown said the Chase case is typical of many of the estimated 58 Americans being kept in deplorable conditions in Ecuadorian prisons.After watching the movie, I became outraged that so much bias and anti-American prejudice actually exists in such barbaric conditions by the Equadoran unjust and backwards legal system, not to mention, the high degree of danger of possible false arrest during your stay, for anything that would warrant an excuse to throw innocent U.S. victims into hellish prison conditions. Even if guilty, the punishment of such inhuman conditions hardly fits the crime, where you will be instantly treated as guilty before having any chance of proved innocent. To make matters worse, never knowing how many years before you even get a trial (with the possibilities of ending up with one of their non English, Spanish speaking lawyers}, You'll never know! Question I'm asking myself is, How many Americans or non So. American citizens have died in this countries stench overcrowded prisons? I gave this movie 10 out of 10 for it's descriptive warning like effect as a "Wake Up Call" for those who may have otherwise felt safe traveling abroad in drug trafficking 3rd world countries. No spoilers for the movie were used, other than my brief explanation of the true events. Point being, before traveling anywhere outside the U.S., It would be very wise to educate yourselves before leaving U.S. American soil and know what you are truly up against. Why take chances!

It's another in the "Americans are never guilty" parade of films. The notion that US citizens are always duped victims in drug smuggling cases is naive at best. While they may not deliberately smuggle drugs in all cases, having worked in travel for many years I can declare that US citizens can be extremely gullible when abroad and equally gullible that "I'm a US citizen" immunizes them from local laws. This is a quite nicely predictable "US citizen unjustly imprisoned" film, and all the predictable people are evil and in league against the poor US citizen. That Americans are naive does not mean they are immune to legal consequences. "I was suckered" is too frequently heard abroad to serve as a defense. And being familiar with Ecuadorian government and law, I can say that they are not exactly the rampant fascists portrayed in this film