Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

If we examine our lives, as AMORES PERROS examines the lives of its characters, we realize we are often closer to animals, especially our pets, than we are to our fellow workers, neighbors, families, friends, lovers -- even our children! In urban societies, we control animals. They depend upon us. In a sense, whatever they may be, our pets guard and decorate our castles. We treat them much of the time as we see fit. And we can depend upon them always to be there for us.

Their response to us, after an initial contact early in their lives, is unvarying. And if it does vary, do we notice? Does it matter?

The loss of a prize animal, however, the death of a pet in our materialistic world, may affect us more than the passing of a family member or lover. A show of grief, or at least respect, over the death of a human is expected, but we owned this animal; it was ours.

As we lose control of our lives in The New World Order, pets are a constant. No real need for expensive gifts, flowers and other bribes. No hellish arguments. No problems that fresh water, pet food, a cleaned environment or a little attention cannot solve. Our love is never misunderstood. Pets seldom willfully abandon us, never cheat or betray us. Again, as AMORES PERROS illustrates, they are always there. And, if for some reason they are taken from us, it is a real disaster, one that cannot be reasoned out, rationalized or explained.

Of all our pets, dogs are closest to most of us: always wanting attention, giving it in kind, greedy but easily satisfied, foolish as we are on occasion, and as vicious as we want them to be. Independent only in their biological needs.

Love (life?) then is (or may be) literally a b*tch.

The film by that name, set in Mexico City, the nightmare future of the New World Order, entwines three stories of "couples" around the life of a brave, ferocious rotweiler named Cofi, and the event which surely should have killed him but for a miraculous intervention.

Cofi, raised in his breed as a killer, is the pet of the brutish Ramiro (Marco Perez), who lives with his teenage wife, a small child and a brother in the dysfunctional slum household of their mother (Adriana Barraza). The brother, Octavio (Gael Garcia Bernal), has witnessed abandonment by their father, the drunken decline of Mama. Daily he sees the cruelty of Ramiro toward his wife Susana (Vanessa Bauche), with whom he has fallen in love. Longing to escape from the poverty and degradation of their existence, Octavio, who walks and cares for Cofi, enters him into a dog fight, hoping to use the winnings to take Susana to a new life in Juarez, perhaps to the United States. Then, in a confrontation with his brother and the gamblers, Cofi is shot, and escaping from the fight scene with the gravely wounded dog and a pal, Octavio crashes a stolen Mercury Grand Marquis into another car, killing his friend and knocking himself out. Valeria (Goya Toledo), the young woman in the other car, suffers a shattered leg and other injuries. A ragged passerby, El Chivo (Emilio Echevarria) assists her and takes the scarcely living Cofi home with him.

The accident is the opening scene of AMORES PERROS, which we keep returning to, in order to pick up the thread of a related story.

After we have been shown the background of the accident, we go forward with Valaria. She is one of those single-name beautiful models who is always being introduced on morning TV talk shows. She is involved with Daniel (Alvaro Guerrero), a 42 year-old businessman, who abandons his wife and family to play house with Valaria and her little dog Richie in a new condo he has purchased for her. As the film moves back and forth in time, running into Octavio and Susana here, glimpsing El Chivo ("The Goat") observe his estranged daughter Maru (Lourdes Eschavarria) there, we note the marked contrast between Valaria before and after the accident. Vain, fatuous, prior to the accident, admiring herself in a huge "Enchanta" clothing ad across the street, she regards life and her picture in a different, rueful way afterward, seeing through Daniel's pompous attentions, appreciating the loyalty of Richie the dog as never before. When he becomes trapped under the hardwood floor of the new apartment, Valaria's life is really put on a tragic path.

The final episode, which moves subliminally into focus, is that of El Chivo, a legendary revolutionary, a former college professor, who abandoned his wife and daughter to aid los de abajo. Now he is reduced to living in the slums with a pack of stray dogs, supporting himself as a hired assassin. The arrival of Cofi brings tragedy also, but from its aftermath, El Chivo begins to move toward redemption, now in the company of his new pet.

You may note that the themes of AMORES PERROS (abandonment, desire, loss, death, redemption) are inherent in the film's development. It is a very violent film of course, if speaking only about the dogs -- assurances (hard to believe) that no animals were injured in the production appear in several places -- but AMORES PERROS is set in the largest city in the World, over 15 million people greater than it was 40 years ago, where, according to the director, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, there are 1, 600, 000 assaults against humans each year. Because we will not, or cannot, control our population growth, Mexico City is the future of Western urban society.

Recently, in my city of San Francisco, a couple, two lawyers, took into their apartment a pair large fighting dogs, who belonged to their adopted son, a former client, a career criminal serving time in Folsom Prison. One day, the dogs got away from the female lawyer and tore a young woman neighbor nearly to pieces. One of the dogs was immediately put down by authorities, and the other is under death sentence, pending the trial her owners for second degree murder, reckless endangerment, etc. The lawyerly couple suggested that the victim brought about her own death, and invoked the Holocaust to describe the investigation of the Police and District attorney. Both vociferous fear and sympathy has surfaced concerning the pets of my sedate city. Whether or not the lawyers are guilty of a crime is for a jury to determine, but the case will have important ramifications in San Francisco.

Art, goes the unavoidable cliche, imitates life. And the other way about.

Director Inarritu, 37 years-old, a former top rated Mexico City radio disk jockey, veteran director of TV commercials, has produced an extraordinary 153 minute feature film debut. AMORES PERROS won major awards as Best Picture at Cannes, Edinburgh, Chicago, Bogata, Havana, Los Angeles and Tokyo, etc. True to form, the Golden Globes and the Oscars gave it only a nomination for Best Foreign Picture.

He and Novelist Guillermo Arriaga worked on AMORES PERRO over a number of years. Much has been made of the influence of the ubiquitous Quentin Tarantino on the film, but Inarritu points to the story structures of American Novelist William Faulkner as being the real inspiration. Anyone who has read The Sound and the Fury will see his point.

Inarritu has drawn wonderful performances from his young actors, a number of whom are Spanish, but, outdoing himself, he makes Emilio Echevarria's performance as El Chivo haunting, iconic. El Chivo rises from the story, the whole movie working toward him, shambling, Walt Whitman-like, a primal father figure. He is indeed the father that the son, the daughter, all the characters have lost. He is the unreliable Father of us all.

If for no other reason, you should see AMORES PERROS to savor his performance.

Meanwhile we have our dogs, cats, hamsters, gold fish, geckoes, snakes . . . . Take care of them. They may be all we are left with.

Amores perros.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age