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The internationally multi-awarded Mexican film Amores Perros (2000)—directed, produced and co-edited by Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárritu and written by Guillermo Arriaga (2001)—begins with a shocking car accident which brings into close proximity the lives of otherwise unrelated characters.1
Around the pivotal narrative crossroads of this dramatic opening sequence, Amores Perros, described in an interview by its director as ‘a visceral film that shouts all the time’, introduces us to several of the events surrounding the motor crash. Cleverly narrated in non-linear fashion through brilliant editing and with the help of flashbacks and flashforwards, the plot unravels in three parallel, yet interconnected, episodes or ‘chapters’ where characters from one appear in, or pass through, another. On one occasion, for instance, the sense of continuity is provided by characters of the second episode taking part in a television programme which is being watched by some of the protagonists of the first one.
The three main stories take place in present-day Mexico City. The first revolves around a young man's frustrating desire to run away with his sister-in-law; the second is about the physical, moral and psychological dissolution of a beautiful woman; and the last narrative concerns the attempts of a mysterious tramp to get back in touch with his long-lost daughter. All three stories are drenched with transgressive passions, almost intolerable violence, and profound humanity. I shall return to these in more detail in the course of this paper.
A variety of critical readings and interpretative keys is available to those wishing to gain access to at least some of the multiple meanings of this film. For instance, one might want to understand Amores Perros by concentrating on the socio-political, moral and philosophical messages which it tries to convey. Alternatively, some critics may try and locate this movie historically within the tradition of Mexican cinema, or of the recent Latin Ameri