Opera Films is a Panamanian auteur film company. We tell stories of our culture, memory and heritage in fiction features and documentaries.
Opera Films was founded in 2021 by Omar Calvo, producer, director and screenwriter trained at ESCAC in Barcelona, beginning with the documentary Memorias del Chagres. The company won Panama’s Fondo Cine grant in 2021 and 2022, and with that momentum produced its first feature, Cautiverio, premiered at Fantaspoa 2026. In co-production with SERTV (the national broadcaster), it produced Salmones Rosas, named Best Film at the Central American Film Festival Vienna.
We develop projects from the first idea, with story building, development plans and strategy for markets and industry events.
Full-scale audiovisual production covering casting, locations, production design, shooting and post-production for film, television and advertising.
A team of writers to move your project forward or close it out, with writing, script doctoring and storyline development.
Panamanian cinema that travels.
Premieres, festivals and awards from our productions.
Panamanian cinema reaches new latitudes. Salmones Rosas, directed by Oscar Faarup, triumphed at India's Rani Durgavati International Film Festival (RDIFF) with a historic haul of ten awards, including Best Film.
Read the full story →Directed by Xochil Vergara and produced by Omar Calvo, San Antonio was one of three winners of the seventh Documental Panamá edition, from 34 proposals. It now enters development with TVN Media and the Alberto Motta Foundation.
Read the story ↗Our first feature, directed by Omar Calvo and Sebastián Jiménez Franco, premiered at the Porto Alegre Fantastic Film Festival and continues its festival run on the way to theaters in Panama and Spain.
About the film →With Panama as guest country, Cautiverio, co-produced with HD Cinema (Colombia) and Movecam (Panama), was selected for MAFIZ and shown to international buyers, platforms and programmers.
Read the story ↗Directed by Óscar Faarup and produced by Opera Films with Faarup Entertainment and SERTV, it won Best Cinematography and a Best Central American Feature nomination, after its Best Film award in Vienna.
Read the story ↗In theaters · 2026
A young man flees through the jungle with his older brother, carrying a secret. To survive the specter that hunts them, both must first confront the horrors of their upbringing.
In theaters · September 2026
A late-career painter tries to recover his voice amid his family's silences and wounds. A portrait of emotional legacy, fragile bonds and what art exacts in return.
Released · 2021
In the early 20th century, the towns along the Chagres River were relocated to build the Panama Canal. The documentary rescues the memory of that lost heritage.
In development
Juan Vega, a veteran orchestra conductor, sets out to record the album he always dreamed of so his musical tradition can live on. With most of his bandmates gone, he turns to a group of school-band students and, along the way, confronts his prejudices about younger generations. We also meet these teenagers who, from different backgrounds and home lives, reveal their fears and hopes for the future. A story about how music holds us steady in times of change, and how tradition finds a way to survive.
Post-production · 2027
In the heart of the tropical Pacific, Coiba is a living laboratory. It once held one of Panama's harshest prisons, and that isolation preserved an almost untouched natural wealth, today a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The documentary travels the island from sea to land, through reefs, hawksbill turtles, blue-carbon mangroves, rainforests and the canopy where the first signs of climate change appear. More than a portrait of an island, it asks what it means to live alongside nature.