Cinema surveillance images are loading at the bottom of the page

Amores perros (Love's a bitch)

Threat advisory: High - High risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

Don't worry if you don't see this picture, you are going to live it anyway.

This movie tells three tales of people and how their relationship to dogs is symbollic of their own situations, all connected by the single tragic event of an automobile accident.

First there is Octavio (Gaël García Bernal), who puts his dog in dog fights to earn enough money that he can run away with his lover, Susana (Vanessa Bauche), who is pregnant and the wife of his brother, Ramiro (Adriana Barraza). Then, there is the rich couple of supermodel Valeria Maya (Goya Toledo) and Daniel (Álvaro Guerrero) whose feelings of being trapped after a car accident is echoed by an incident when their dog becomes trapped as well. Finally, there is an ex-guerrilla, El Chico (Emilio Echevarría), whose discovery of a lost dog inspires him to reunite with his own long-lost daughter.

Target demographic movie keyword propaganda

Film drama crime dog Spanish Mexico relationship

Persons of interest

Gaël García Bernal .... Octavio
Vanessa Bauche .... Susana
Adriana Barraza .... Ramiro
Goya Toledo .... Valeria May
Álvaro Guerrero .... Daniel
Emilio Echevarría .... El Chico
Jorge Salinas .... Luis Miranda
Guillermo Arriago Jordan .... Screenwriter
Alejandro González Iñárritu .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

Awards and film festivals:

British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) 2002: Best foreign language film
Chicago Film Festival 2000: Gold Hugo for best feature, silver Hugo for best actor (Emilio Echevarria and Gael Garcia Bernal), Gap audience award
Cannes Film Festival 2000: Best film critics week, international critics' week Grand rail d'or (audience award), Prix de la jeune critique Mercedes Benz (young critics award)
Edinburgh Film Festival 2000: Best new director
Tokyo Film Festival 2000: Grand prix, best director, Governor of Tokyo award
Camerimage Film Festival 2000: Golden frog award for cinematography (Rodrigo Prieto)
Flanders Film Festival 2000: Grand prix for best director
AFI Los Angeles Film Festival 2000: Audience award
Sao Paulo Film Festival 2000: Critics award for best film, special mention for Inarritu's cinematographic language
Festival de cine iberoamericano (Cuba) 2000: Glauber Rocha best picture
Montréal Film Festival 2000: Prix du scenario radio/Canada screenplay award (Guillermo Arriago Jordan)
Festival internacional de valdivia (Chile) 2000: Audience award for best film
Oscars 2000: Award for most successful Mexican film of 2000 at the box office, Mexico's entry for best foreign language film
Golden Globes 2001: Nomination: Best foreign film

NB: Spanish language dialogue with English language subtitles
Studios and distributors:

Lions Gate Films * Niche

Intelligence analyst

Agent Felipe Mejia

Theatrical report

A well made and well told film, with a not necessarily brilliant but well structured and coherent screenplay.

Amores perros is an ironic, realistic and human film which explores the destructive, darker side of human relationships and its detriment to society through three intertwined stories, a common construction in Mexican cinema.

However, this Mexican movie has lost some of its identity by trying too hard to fit the Hollywood model - think Pulp fiction - at times the performances lack strength, like the exaggerated Daniel's hysteria attacks and El Chico's heavy handed moralising about the story of the two brother-partners; they undercut much of what Amores perros has tried to say and be.

On the other hand, the main purpose of the film is to show a hard and cruel Latin-American reality without the glossiness of a thirty second news bite. It certainly achieves this with a solid screenplay, well-defined characters and impeccable presentation from the cinematography and the soundtrack. All these features make Amores perros a film that leaves you thinking about those most human and social aspects: ambition, fidelity and beauty.