Perro come perro

Whoa, whoa!!! Stop the horses... Saying that "Perro Come Perro" is kind of Tarantino's or Ritchie's work might have, it's the biggest lie on earth. I'm from Colombia too, but... sincerely: leave aside the stupid patriotism. I've seen this movie with other titles before... it's nothing new, but it's not bad at all... The only point it's worth to enhance is the direction of Carlos Moreno... it's methodical and creative. The screenplay has a lot of clichés and flaws, the worst one is the Adela situation... that's a popular joke turn into a movie... the violence it's free of charge and I'm not talking about the chainsaw scene... this is not so graphic like the one in Scarface, man... the actors, I don't know... either of them don't bring it out for a nomination of anything. Anyone could have done that parts the same way and nobody sees the difference. The music is good, Superlitio sounds strong and cool in the soundtrack... At the end, with Perro Come Perro, you can go to the movies to hang out and eat some popcorn.

Colombia's film/television productions are widely criticized for their thematic fixation and romantization on our dark past of drug lords and hitmen, yet this film achieves what it wants. It's far from a romantic portrayal of the lives of drug dealers and hitmen; it's a red flag, a huge banner that says STAY AWAY. We follow our characters through their descent into death's inescapable grip, one bad decision after the other. Haunted by guilt, witchcraft, anger, remorse, the script is solid enough to create memorable characters that we start caring about, although at points the narrative loses its focus. There are several interesting narrative tools that leave you pleasantly surprised, such as the persistent telephone calls asking about "Adela". Some characters lack foundation, the only memorable and relatable ones are Víctor and Benítez. The editing's pretty off, there are certain very unnecesary cuts at times and the color grading makes it seem like an American portrayal of Mexico. The soundtrack's outstanding and most of the acting is well-achueced. Overall, a good movie.

This is an accurate while though portrait of crime underworld in Cali (second biggest Colombian city), plenty of a dark sense of humor and local culture elements such as witchery, drug traffic, poverty, and a very interesting atmosphere of salsa and African American music.

It is remarkable the photography direction, specially the coloring and texture of all movie, which emphasizes the feeling of permanent heat (Cali is a tropical place). Oh, and the FX work is very convincing. If you have a lot of gunshots, you will need a lot of fake blood, right? Well, in this film every gun fire sequence is very well played without making you get out of focus of main plot.

Main characters are played in a very convincing way with a very local taste, but in the end of the film you get the feeling of having witnessed events that could happen at the darkest corners of any city in the world.

When the ending titles of "Perro come perro" came out, movies like "The Long Good Friday", "Once upon a time in America" and "Cidade de deus" came to my mind. This film is made with the same artistry, the same dark humor and specially with the same approach to criminal life.

Great character development, accomplished cinematography and a clear understanding of the Cali underworld are some of the qualities this movie brings to the viewer.

This movie is for Cali what "Snatch" was for London and it works so well.

Of course there are some flaws, but this movie is such and acomplishment that you can let them go.

A breath of fresh air for Colombian Cinema and the "Dago-Formula" that comes every year.

My deepest congratulations to the crew of "PCP", you've made a mark in Colombian Cinema History.

"Perro come perro", a.k.a. "Dog Eat Dog", has been announced as a groundbreaking feature film in Colombian cinema, mainly for being a participant in Sundance Festival 2008. I even got to read a review saying that it would be the next "Amores Perros" of South America and that it marked a new period for Colombian cinema. As an openminded person who loves cinema, I was very much persuaded of seeing the film for the positive reviews: I definitely expected a whole lot more of what I got to see on the screen. Those propagandistic reviews are the motivation behind this personal commentary.

PCP is seriously flawed in many ways. We may start on the overacting of most of the cast. Now then, if it hadn't been for the superficial way in which the themes were dealt with, the spectators could have empathised with at least something; but there's no space for empathy to happen. On the contrary, the supposed seriousness of the main characters' problems is ludicrous.

The plot in itself is quite straightforward: it's a film based more on atmospheres than on actions. If the movie fails to portray a plausible atmosphere is because of its overdirecting. Without any relevant plot twists and several obvious elements, it tries to appeal in any available form to the audience, even resulting in ridiculous comic relief situations. The soundtrack (original music) and title sequence seem like made for another kind of movie. The 'over the top' post-production (colour correction, editing, sound design) only makes us too aware of the directorial efforts to be innovative. Let's face it: if you're going to do "another" Colombian-violence related-gangster film, try at least not to step on the abundant clichés available for the genre. Instead we get to see a handful of badly used cinematic resources within a weak story.

Besides the flaws aforementioned, what I least liked is its thematic emptiness. There are so many pointless situations!! This is made especially annoying with some exaggerated gratuitous violence scenes. All in all, I never got the point of the film (not the story, which is far too simple). What I mean is that it doesn't really say anything new or interesting about the topic, nor it has a cinematic proposal that would rescue the film from being a commonplace empty gangster-sicario movie, as what it really is.