Movie Review of Amores Perros (2000)

Amores Perros was the 2000 debut for Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu. It was also the debut for writer Guillermo Arriaga and the two teamed up to develop their own signature style which would continue through 21 Grams and Babel. In many ways Amores Perros owes its own homage to Pulp Fiction, but while that’s something many directors have attempted and ultimately botched, this one is amazingly successful spawning its own well crafted screenplay, striking changes of pace, and originality.

Amores Perros even in my basic Spanish says something about love and dogs, two themes that are prevalent in each of the movie’s three substories. A subtitled translation of the title is “Love’s A B1tch,” but Iñárritu himself didn’t find that title satisfactory. The movie poster suggests a play on words, inferring that “amores” meaning love refers to all that is desirable, and “perros” refers to all that is wretched, miserable or bad luck.

The movie opens with a breathtaking car chase. Two young men sit in the front while a blood soaked Rottweiler lies in the back. There’s a significant similarity to Reservoir Dogs here. A crash brings the scene to a brutal halt, one that happens to be the intersection of our three substories. Our first story is about a young man, Octavio (Gael García Bernal) who lives with his brother, sister-in-law, and their baby. While Octavio’s brother is a street thug who clearly abuses his wife, Octavio is the more noble and secretly plans to elope with the sister-in-law. He hatches a plan around his Rottweiler who it turns out is lovable in the home, but pretty vicious when thrown into the dog fighting arena. This point deserves special mention as the dog fighting scenes are unashamedly brutal. They’re barely watchable especially in a time when so much was brought to notice in the Michael Vick case. The movie does carry a side note that no animals were harmed in the production but that will be little solace to many, and I do have to question the director’s taste and discretion here. It’s testament to the story then that Octavio can be such a likeable character and a cause we root for. It’s Octavio’s car incidentally that causes the aforementioned crash in the movie’s opening scene.

In the second story we meet a wealthy family man who leaves his wife to shack up with a famous celebrity model. In this segment we get a couple of characters that are tough to sympathize with. He left his wife, she’s narcissistic and spoiled. The model becomes the unwitting victim of Octavio’s car chase, to the point of being wheelchair bound. She has a little prize pooch that in urban legend style gets trapped beneath her apartment’s floorboards. We intermittently hear the dog’s cries and scurrying around, or could that be the rats? The emotional strains of the characters play their own part in the strain on this ugly relationship. It’s slow paced and somewhat at odds with the opening and close (all the time I was wondering what happened to Octavio and his dog) but while it plays on the psychological element it had the potential to be a cool little Masters of Horror episode.

Then in the third segment we meet a vagrant who we’ve seen a couple of times in the movie already. Named El Chivo, he’s played by famed actor Emilio Echevarría, and the vagabond façade is a convenient front for his trade as a hitman for hire. A former revolutionary, he’s estranged from his daughter (who thinks he’s dead) and finds companionship in the stray dogs he picks up. He’s the final act and in many ways he plays the movie’s redemption, you could say he’s “The Shepherd” that Samuel L. Jackson was trying to be in Pulp Fiction. Enlisted with the assignment of killing a young and ambitious yuppie’s partner, he’s forced to make his own choice while he toys with the idea of finding his way back into his daughter’s life.

While I was turned off in the early segment by the graphic reality of the dog fighting scenes, I couldn’t help but be drawn in by Iñárritu’s fascinating directorial style and the great storylines he plays on. I didn’t care too much for the middle segment but Octavio and El Chivo were two protagonists that we could really feel for. Much of that credit has to go to the actors who portray them. Echevarría is initially classy, he looks dirty and smelly but there’s a still an element of admirable coolness to his character. But his character develops more than that as we really get to appreciate the loneliness and isolation of his life and the moralistic choices that face him. Bernal also joined the list of debutants here (Blindness, Babel, Motorcycle Diaries, Y tu mamá también) and he’s equally impressive. A couple of his actions might make him yet another detestable character, but we learn that he’s a noble and dignified young man whose poor choices are a result of the only way of life he knows. It’s a complicated role and Bernal plays it exceptionally.

Amores Perros is a huge success. It’s violent and ugly at times, but it’s also mature and thought provoking. It’s better than 21 Grams and Babel which I thought dwelled too long on the psychology of the moment to the point of moving too slow. Amores Perros delivers plenty of action while allowing ample time to appreciate the moralistic issues.

Verdict: 4 ½ Stars Highly Recommended