Rating: 
Summary: Feverish And Driven.
Review: "Amores Perros" comes as a roaring sigh in this era of commercial filmmaking over-flowing the market. It is a masterwork done with passion, intelligence and absolute brilliance. With this film director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu has announced his genius to the world and his status as a new major player in the directing game. He comes flying in like Oliver Stone and Martin Scorsese with their first films. What makes this such a great movie is how it vibrates it feeling and realism, we can relate to the characters because they feel real. The film is divided into three stories within Mexico City (but they could take place anywhere else), the first, "Octavio And Susana" is a tale of forbidden lust when Octavio (played by the now popular Gael Garcia Bernal) falls for his hard-edged brother's wife and uses his dog for dogfighting as a way to get some money in a scheme to run off with Susana. This is the story that takes us into the bowels of Mexican culture, into the dark corners of any city, with rich characters and deliciously bloody, violent scenarios that remind us of Arturo Ripstein, who's "Deep Crimson" was another great macabre work of Mexican cinema, or there are also traces of "Los Olvidados" by the great Luis Bunuel, surely the most influential director to work in Mexico (while in exile from Spain). The next story, "Daniel And Valeria" is a darkly comic tale of superficial ways of life being crushed by the realities OF life. Daniel works in a fashion magazine and leaves his wife and children for a beautiful supermodel who loses her leg in a horrible car accident. Here we see some of the film's strongest acting as the emotions boil and ultimately explode. The last tale is "El Chivo And Maru" about an ex-guerrilla hired by a businessman to kill his brother. This story too has great elements of dark comedy injected into the tense drama but the real heart of the story is the surprising truths behind the identity of El Chivo. "Amores Perros" is sure to be an influential film among new young directors, and yet it is so good because it is obvious Inarritu knows the works of the greats like Scorsese and Bunuel and knows what to borrow and how to polish what he borrows to a gloss. Obviously this is the kind of movie that makes reputations, consider that cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, who brings a rich, gritty look to the movie, has already been hired by Oliver Stone for his epic "Alexander." And Inarritu recently participated in a September 11 film composed of 11 films by 11 directors. "Amores Perros" is real, vibrant cinema, just look at the opening chase scene that completely grips us. It is a visceral work that should be watched by all who appreciate good movies and want something new and fresh.
Rating: 
Summary: Fine transfer of a great film
Review: This Mexican triptych of interwoven dramas has won many awards, and deserves them all. It has been hailed as a Latin American 'Pulp Fiction' although the opening scene with a bleeding victim on a car rear seat resembles the beginning of Reservoir Dogs, so perhaps the film is a homage to Tarantino in general.All the performances are excellent, and if the central story is perhaps less exciting than the outer ones, it certainly lingers in the memory. The film is shot very much in a documentary style, with the camera probing into the violent underbelly of Mexico City's subculture and (fleetingly) its more affluent inhabitants. Although it comes in at well over two hours this film had me gripped until the last frame, and I recommend it thoroughly to lovers of fine cinema. The first story (which all have a link with dogs) centres on a love triangle in which an unemployed young man loves his hoodlum brother's wife, and enters the brutal world of dog fighting. In the middle tale a glamorous model's life takes a horrific downturn when she is separated from her talisman-like pet dog. The finale shows a dog-loving assassin's life reaching a kind of epiphany when he unwittingly takes in a killer to live among his 'family'. The threads of all their lives are gathered together in a devastating car crash which forms the film's climax. Among the performances, that of Emilio Echevarria as the vagrant assassin is superb. The DVD is very fine. Director Alejandro Inarritu (a fantastic talent), shoots in such a realistic style that he rarely uses artificial lighting, so while the anamorphic transfer is very fine and detailed, do not expect a slick Hollywood production. He is aiming for a gritty realism, and certainly achieves it. Occasionally there is a touch of grain in the image but for the most part this is a good transfer of a source print that is itself not the last word in cinematic sophistication. One could be forgiven for believing that his cast were simply dragged off the street and told to perform on location (perhaps some were: the streetwise 'manager' of the ghastly dog fighting club gives a performance that is remarkable in its greasy seediness). The sound is also first rate.
Rating:
Summary: Exhilarating
Review: (See above for synopsis)
This film BRILLIANTLY links 3 very different stories together (via an horrific car accident), and there aren't many movies that link stories cleverly as this. This is a shocking, exhilarating, disturbing, violent and even at times touching (the depth of feeling the assassin has for his dogs is very moving) film, which is brilliantly acted and brilliantly directed.
A genuine modern classic. For those who have doubts because it's a subtitled film - this is a brilliant film to cut your teeth on, and will open your eyes to a world of cinema that you may have ignored until now.
Rating: 
Summary: is it just me. . .?
Review: maybe i'm the stupid one. i've seen so many great reviews of this movie and i loved the director's new movie, 21 grams, so i decided it would make sense to see this one. i was a bit dissapointed. maybe there is something big that i am missing in the point of the movie, or maybe the point itself is just a letdown. it seems to me that there was this nasty car crash and through it, the movie tells 3 different stories about the people involved. there is a lot about familial relations, namely between brothers and maybe the dogs are metaphores for brothers. it is also about how (...) happens to different people. otherwise, the first story is entertaining and my favorite, the 3rd is the best in terms of theme, and the 2nd just seems boring and irrelevent. they are 3 different storeis which are loosely but forcedly connected and i don't understand why everyone says this is the best movie ever.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best
Review: I do not get to see a lot of foreign films, but this one seemed interesting enough. As with many other people, I heard it was a Mexican version of Pulp Fiction. Yes, the structure is the same, the violent content similar, both casts were engaging. But for some reason, this movie worked even better. Amores Perros is set is a rather bleak and desperate slums of Mexico, where, as with all other third world countries, despair seems to be in the oxygen. Somehow, these three stories intertwine in one fateful moment. And dogs, truly man's best friend, were all there to witness it. The dogs in the movie serve as counterpoints to the people. In more ways than one, the dogs are, despite hunger and ticks, seem to have more fulfilling lives than the people. Whether it be money, power, passion or a fit of rage, the people here, somehow, cannot seem to control themselves, and what would have been made better is now infinitely worse. This is a kinetic movie. It is so good you forget you are watching a film. The acting is at its most natural and effortless. If this is the state of Mexican cinema, it is in pretty darn good shape. Hope other people can come up with equally provoking films.
Rating:
Summary: Underneath It All, It's An Intimate Film About Families
Review: The reason why this film works so beautifully is that beneath the plot veneer of violence and schemes is a common theme of family and strained relationships that connects all the characters. A man falls in love with his brother's wife and plans to run away with her. A contract killer comes to terms with his past in which he left his wife and daughter for a revolutionary cause. A brother wants to kill his half-brother for money. A man leaves his devoted wife to pursue his love for a model... All these characters and situations are drawn beautifully, without easy caricaturization: all the people and situations in this movie are complex. "Amores Perros", aside from its dizzying, frenetic plot and action, is one of the more contemplative films about strains of human and familial relationships, and the loneliness that comes from them. The dialogue is tough, but lyrical, and some of the metaphors are very effective. For example, the female model's dog jumps into a hole in the floor and doesn't surface back up. This not only creates a strange tension, but also reflects the psychological unease that accompanies the relationship between the man and the woman. "Amores Perros" is a happy confluence of filmmaker's passion and careful craftsmanship. International cinema is fast catching up, and threatening to surpass American cinema.
Rating:
Summary: excellent
Review: what an excellent movie. if you aren't an idiot and can read subtitles watch this movie, this is what movies today should apire to be.
Rating:
Summary: Really should get 2.5 stars...
Review: This isn't a horrible movie necessarily; if I saw it on TV or something like that, I would probably be satisfied. Unfortunately, it does not live up to expectations. I haven't seen "21 Grams", so I can't comment on how this compares. What I can say is there are some great parts: the car crash is insanely great and so is the dogfighting element of the film. Unfortunately, the pluses stop at the superficial level; the plot isn't all there and the actors aren't stellar. Not bad, but I wouldn't go out of my way to see it. Find something else to feel artsy.
Rating:
Summary: One for the Ages
Review: I've rarely seen anything like this. Seeing the dogs rip into each other - there is a kind visceral violence there that is really wrenching and missing from American films, the kind that touches the hard-wires at the back of one's brain. This film takes you there. The whole movie experience completely envelopes and separates the audience from the here and now and takes us to the Mexican dreamworld. I could taste the blood in my mouth while I watched this thing, and I surely felt the ulcers these characters were building as they walked through their stories. His people really suffer - and they feel fully fleshed out, with inner emotion and deep stress. The performances are such that the acting is almost invisible. The feeling is fly-on-the-wall such that I felt I knew these people in their most personal moments, full of rivalry, blood-lust, anger.. All sorts of brilliant, burning taboo emotions that are rarely porrayed in mainstream film. Innaritu is the Mexican Scorsese - only younger and with more fire in the blood. His style requires no setups - He basically launches the characters into tense, brutal events, forming plots that dovetail together in perfect synchronicity. He can say more with a sly glance than most directors accomplish in whole movies. He's a Picasso to George Lucas's flat etch-a-sketch. I don't know if he'll ever be a box-office darling - there are no kid-friendly puppet-contraptions in the works - but this guy is a cinema superstar and a true artist. His work will live forever (or at least a very long time.) Also see '26 Grams' with Naomi Watts - also worth it's weight in gold.
Rating:
Summary: FRESH AND ORIGINAL, BUT JUST A TOUCH SHORT OF BEING A GEM
Review: While it's a high-action, low-plot film with a creative patchwork of screenplay, Amores Perros is definitely a movie you should watch at least once. It's effortlessly fresh and original. The movie's style is certainly inspired by the stylism of Pulp Fiction or Traffic. That is, it consists of three stories that tie themselves together in the end. This method of film making has become such a cliché, but it can be done if the director succeeds in making each story equally interesting. Unfortunately, Amores Perros starts with a bang, but its final two stories drag on while the viewer struggles to stay awake. (And it is a looong movie!) The first story of the film is, to say the least, brilliant. It revolves around a young man named Octavio (Gael Bernal) who enters the bizarre world of dog-fighting so he can earn enough money to run away with his abusive brother's wife and child. Things, however, do not go exactly as expected, as the dog-fighting goes terribly wrong, and Octavio's dream of running away is crushed. As far as the first story goes, Inarritu did not wrong. In fact, it's easy to say that this segment of the film is flawlessly executed. The soundtrack, the cinematography, the acting and the lighting all come together to create quite a spectacle. The fact that Inarritu chose to use this segment first was really a poor decision. When it ends, I was left looking for something at or around the same caliber, and I was greatly disappointed with what came next. The second story concerns a model named Valeria (Goya Toledo) living with a her boyfriend who left his wife just to be with her. The beginning of the story is intriguing, but the ironic coincidence is that when the two lovers' lives begin to fall apart, the movie takes a turn for the worst as well. Instead of the entertaining and fast paced love thriller Amores Perros had been to this point, I was now treated to a obnoxiously slow and boring tale of a degenerative relationship. Story three is, well, better, but that's not saying much. The story revolves around a supposedly mysterious man who gave up his family and life to become a rebel. His rebel days behind him, the man (Emilio Echevarria) is now a bum/assassin for hire who walks around with a pack of dogs. During a 'job' the man rediscovers his former self, and realizes what a grave mistake he had made by leaving his family. This part had vast potential but it's clear that the director did not try to develop this man's character for a sort of mysterious effect. Sadly, I found that I knew so little about the character that I really couldn't care less what his fate was. As a whole, Amores Perros stacks up to be a slightly above average movie. It runs simply far too long, and it does not focus enough on the first story, which is the only thing really carrying the film. But that shouldn't detract you from watching it at least once. It's a very worthy rental if only for the glimpses of directorial brilliance.
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