Perro come perro

This sun-baked slice of nihilism from Colombia is a very interesting watch indeed. Although there's plenty of yelling and gun-waving, there's also a very ominous feeling about the whole show. Marlon Moreno definitely has presence as the lead, Victor, who must deal with family problems and tries to solve it by stealing money from a dead lackey belonging to his big boss, a snarlingly fun Blas Jaramillo. Holed up in a hotel room with fellow gangster Eusebio (Oscar Borda) Victor waits for the order to find and kill whoever stole the money (himself) and keeps receiving crazy phone calls from a half-mad man looking for a woman named Adela. If this all sounds like fun to you, it is. On top of all that, Eusebio may or may not be "cursed" by a dead man or just going bugnuts crazy. Yes, there's something for everyone here. The only drawback I can think of is it feels a tad too short and a few of the lead characters aren't fleshed out enough to truly care for them when the screws are really put to them. There's plenty of style, however, and you'll being humming the title theme long after it's over.

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.

A few hours ago, I was talking with two female acquaintances about violence in movies, and how difficult it is for them to cope with this issue.

Truthfully, after watching this film, I felt some of the emotions and feelings they described,why? the violence in "Dog Eat Dog" is intense but I am not talking about the physical violence, I am not talking about the blood and gore, but the mental and psychological turbulence that the characters have to endure, and with them, us the viewers. It is like watching Reservoir Dogs for the first time, but darker,with elements of black magic, that can be understand by the Latin culture, in a different way than Hollywood standards.

Because of the atmosphere created in this mentally- violent story, I felt proud of understanding two languages,because even though I am not from Colombia, I was able to sync with the angst and desperation of these bad guys, even though I found them despicable, all of them! each in a different way. And still I found myself wishing for the bad guy, (as I did for Bruce Willis in "Pulp Fiction") to find his way out of the mud.

I did not find comedy in this movie, "Sierra" is not funny in any way, he is just the classic bully, sarcastic and brutal with a smile on his face. As a crime story it fills with meanness, nastiness and despair, and unlike "Bummer" (2003) , there is no, loyalty or camaraderie, or honor, it is a cold world where money means everything to the extent of chopping another human being into pieces.

I found it even "Hitchcock style" building up, getting into your nerves and making you feel the heat of their city, and like in 'The Plague Dogs" (1982), you feel like all hope should be abandoned and discarded.

As I have said in my reviews, I have seen it all and hardly get impressed by a movie, unless it's one of those rare gems as "Cold Blooded" (2012) or this time "Perro come perro".

I really recommend this one, but if you are not really into movies as a form of art, better stick yourself to "Transformers" or "I Frankenstein'" or "Sin City" because they are easy to digest and comprehend, I said this because I think you may be really unhappy not catching up about who was "Adela", that is easily identified in the movie "...vos como te llamas?" The rest is to put two and two together.

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.

I recently saw this at the 2009 Palm Springs International Film Festival. This was Columbia's official submission for consideration in Best Foreign film to the Academy Awards. This is also the debut film of writer/director Carlos Moreno and he offers up a dark crime drama mixed with dark comedy in this film set in infamous drug cartel city of Cali. victor (Marlon Moreno) and Eusedio (Oscar Borda) are two low level criminals, one who has stolen a bag of his bosses drug money and the other who has killed the bosses godson. The consequences of their actions drive the darkly witty plot with lots of twists, turns and gruesome killings. It's a fast paced script from director Moreno along with Alonso Torres and colorful cinematography by Juan Carlos Gil. Still it's a typical blood and guts mob movie about greed and betrayal but it does have several interesting characters and some strange comedy like a Quentin Tarantino might have. I would give it a 7.0 out of 10.