"Amores Perros" Blogs and Blabs

"Amores Perros" is a set of three stories of the lives of three different people in Mexico City that converge in this dramatic thriller. Octavio is sharing an apartment with his brother, which leads to a serious problem when he falls in love with Susanna, his sister-in-law. Octavio and Susanna want to run away together, but Octavio has no money. He does, however, know a man who stages dog fights, and he volunteers his dog Cofi for the next round of fights. Cofi bravely rises to the occasion, but the dog's success in the ring leads to a violent altercation. Elsewhere, Daniel, a successful publishing magnate, leaves his family to take up with a beautiful model, Valeria. Valeria, however, soon loses a leg in an auto accident, and as Daniel tends to her needs, her tiny pet dog gets trapped under the floorboards of their apartment. And finally, El Chivo is an elderly homeless man who is trying to contact his daughter, whom he hasn't seen in years. Desperate for money, El Chivo is hired by a businessman to assassinate his partner; however, as he's following his target, he's interrupted by an auto accident, from which Octavio and his injured dog stagger in search of help. "Amores Perros" was the debut from director Alexandro Gonzalez Inarritu.I thought the movie was well played out and very intense. The first story of Octavio was the most gripping, and the most dramatic of the three stories. The auto accident that played such a poignant part of each of the three lives reminds me of many movies that I have seen where a fatal accident has brought together many lives for one purpose. For instance, the movie "Intersection" and "Crash" reminded me of this movie. In my opinion, this movie is a tribute to love. The entire movie is about love. As the title suggests, the dogs in the movie symbolizes love. Roughly, everytime something bad happens to the dog(s) in one of the segments, the love also seems to go downhill: Octavio and Susanna's love is destroyed, not long after Cofi gets shot. Richie disappears under the floor, shortly thereafter Valeria and Daniels relationship goes downhill. Its a bit different with El Chivo. He loses all of his dogs, but gains a new one, Cofi. This represents a change in state of mind regarding his love to his lost daughter. Maybe he realizes that love (dogs) is fragile, and can die, and sees that he has to do it now, not later (that beeing contacting his daughter). Here's also a parallel to Octavios much asked question to Susanna: If not now, when? The end closes the movie incredibly beautifully for me. The name Negro (black), for his new dog, his new love, and the ending scene is in my opinion very beautiful symbolism: El Chivo comes up with the name Negro (black), it seems, rather randomly when asked by the mechanic, like its a bit of a coinsidence og just something he says. Then when he walks away, the ground as long as you can see, is black. And the picture fades to black. The way I interpreted it was that everything is love. The dogs (loves) name is Negro (black), and the ground El Chivo walks on is black, and at last, everything is black.