Amores Perros, Alejandro González Iñárritu (2000)

Amores Perros deals with three storylines of antiheroes that all collide in a tragic car accident. The first deals with the incestuous love between an adolescent, Octavio, and his sister-in-law Susana . The second is about an editor, Daniel , who abandons his family to live with Valeria , a model that eventually has her leg amputated. The last tale focuses on an ex-terrorist and professional killer, "El Chivo", who tries to recover the love of his daughter. Inaritu weaves and throws the storylines together into what culminates into a Picasso-esque narrative. It’s a little disjointed but then so was Mexican society. The film apparently portrays an image of Mexico that many were offended by, yet the film is one of the most internationally successful to come out of Mexico. What I think Innaritu was really trying to convey, in a most sympathetic way, was that Mexico is on the brink of change. Although the film shows a very corrupt and shallow side to Mexico it also insinuates that by facing up to these unattractive truths, Mexico is maturing.

The juxtapositions between the three story lines highlight the social contrasts within Mexican society whilst showing that people from different ends of society share similar imperfections. Each character seems to share the fatal flaw of infidelity which contradicts the beliefs of Mexico’s catholic heritage. Throughout the film there is a lot of religious iconography that seems to symbolize the ever-watching eye of God that condemns the characters of their infidelities. The dog too, which is stuck under the floorboards, represents this nagging guilt that festers beneath the surface. However, Innaritu encourages us not to lay fault to the characters but rather feel frustrated for them as victims of a corrupt society. Though their actions have not always been wise, Innaritu tells us that life in Mexico city does not make it easy to make the right choices in a place that seems so bleak and hopeless. Innaritu displays this with verisimilitude and depth; the picture is de-saturated, the frames are very busy and mise-en-scene is full of sweat, cigarettes and beer, constructing the impression of a very dirty environment. It is also shot in very contained medium shots, no long shots or focus points, making Mexico appear as very oppressed.

A major theme in Amores Perros is the injustice of a patriarchal society. The film puts emphasis on the male experience and male domination. The title of the film itself translated is “Love’s a Bitch”. This directly points to the gender inequalities in Mexico as a bitch is a pun referring to a derogatory name for a female. “Bitch” also refers to the metaphor of choice throughout the film as all the story lines in one way another have dogs leading their narratives. In Cofi, a black Rottweiler, we have a well-developed instinct and loyalty. He represents the paradigm of the masculine; he is brave, strong, aggressive and damaging. Just as he fights bestially for his primacy in the dog fight, so do the brothers Ramiro and Octavio. Cofi contrasts with Richie, the small white Maltese who exemplifies the stereotype of the feminine. Richie is loyal, has little intelligence and utilizes his cuteness to manipulate and achieve his objectives just as Valeria does. When Cofi instinctively kills El Chivo’s other dogs to exercise his territorial power, El Chivo becomes possessed with a reflexive vengeance. He contains himself though when he realizes suddenly that he himself is an assassin just like the dog.

In film, dogs constitute an invisible hand known as "petting the dog", utilized normally by the screenwriters to subliminally influence a sympathetic opinion of the character. Moreover, the analogising between dogs and people suggests that as we recognise in dogs their lack of awareness of good and evil and a proclivity for pure instinct, perhaps we should look upon our characters as beings just as defenceless against the lawless and corrupt world of Mexican Society.