Octavio is still in love with Susana, still wants her to run away with him - the movie ends with the scene in the bus station where he finally finds out whether she will or not. References to Cain and Abel are made.įinally, we are back to the other brothers: Octavio and Ramiro, who also takes a punt at the biggest job of his life, by robbing a bank. Instead, he kidnaps them both and makes them face up to each other: if one wants the other dead, he'll have to do it himself. He provides a kind of moral centre to the movie: after he finally makes contact with his daughter, he is commissioned to kill one brother at the behest of the other. In the meantime, he is a contract killer, much richer than his appearance as a bum would suggest. His daughter thinks he is dead: El Chivo wants to pick up his relationship with her, but clearly doesn't know how. Instead, he was imprisoned for 20 odd years. It turns out that El Chivo has quite a back story - he had a nice middle class background but threw it all away to pursue his political beliefs, thinking he could make the world a better place. He picks Cofi up and takes him home to join his collection of stray dogs, where he nurses him back to health (with tragic results). The third segment is a bit more random: El Chivo ("the goat") is simply an onloooker, an apparently homeless man pushing a barrow of junk around. Sure, the dog is just as trapped as Valeria is, but I'm not convinced this added much. He manages to fall through a hole in the floor and can't get out, can't even be located for days. There was also a dog in this scene: a stupid rich person's dog, the sort that gets carried around. Given that he had left one woman to come to her, I was surprised he stuck it out so long when things got tough. After the crash, of course, there is no modelling for her: most of the action is in her apartment, where the relationship between her and Daniel gets nmore and more tense. I think there is a point being made here about the randomness of fate: she is not insulated by her position in society. The second segment is about the occupant of the other car, Valeria: she is a top fashion model who has seduced Daniel away from his wife. About 15 fights into his career, Cofi is lined up against Jarocho's latest find for the biggest purse so far: rather than let the fight proceed, Cofi is shot, Jarocho is stabbed and thus we get the car-chase scene with which the movie opened. There are plenty of dog-fighting scenes which, despite being simulated, were pretty hard to take. With the money he is making, he wants Susana to run away with him. Octavio is in love with Susana and finds that he can make a living by entering his dog, Cofi, into dog fights. Ramiro is hyper and violent: he makes his living by working in a drug store and occasionally robbing it. Octavio (Gael García Bernal) is living in cramped quarters with his brother Ramiro and sister-in-law, Susana. The opening credits roll, and then the first third of the movie fills in how we get to the car crash. Instead of telling us, the car crashes into another and catches fire. Then there are more guys in a bright yellow truck chasing them gun in hand - why? We don't know. Things start with a bang in this movie: two young guys are driving their car down some urban street, talking about how the near dead dog on the back seat was shot and might not make it.