There's a little of Pulp Fiction, a lot of Go, and a bundle of moviemaking bravura packed into Amores Perros, the award-winning first feature film by Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, from a script by novelist Guillermo Arriaga. As in Pulp and Go, violence crosses paths with chance. As in Pulp and Go, the narrative doubles back as the focus shifts, in the course of multiple re-tellings, to characters on the outskirts of the throat-grabbing opening scene — a nail-biter car chase through the streets of Mexico City.
Unlike in those two very cool North American yarns, however, behavior is not divorced from moral consequence in Inarritu's molten Mexican passion play, an Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film. Amores Perros is loosely translated as ''Love Is a Bitch,'' and the elemental dog-eat-dog nature of humans is expressed not only in disturbing glimpses of brutal, backroom dog-fights, but also in the relationships between the animals and their owners. A soft young man (Gael Garcia Bernal), in love with his bullying brother's wife (Vanessa Bauche), treats his killer dog gently; a businessman (Alvaro Guerrero) who leaves his family for a flouncy model (Goya Toledo) is undone by her flouncy pet; a bitter former political activist, now a wary bum (Mexican star Emilio Echevarria), cares more for his pack of mutts than for his neighbors. Fierce, loving, and electric, this movie's got bite as well as bark.
Add your comment
The rules: Keep it clean, and stay on the subject or we might delete your comment. If you see inappropriate language, e-mail us. An asterisk * indicates a required field.