Did he HAVE to hang the dog?

YES!, it is a metaphor. A FEW metaphors, in fact.

But that uncomfortable feeling you had? It's the whole point! A foreshadowing of things to come. Yakin chose NOT to show you the deaths of Chuckie, the beating of Jake, nor the slayings at the store - but he DID show you this. The reason for that choice should be obvious, very much the same way why Mel Gibson showed little graphic violence in the early parts of Braveheart - throat slashing shown from the chin up, etc. Then Wallace's revenge is shown in ALL it's graphic, bloody close up so we can 'get it': it's gonna be like this from now on...

And Larnoc is absolutely correct: The scene on the basketball courts outweighs anything else you see in this movie, and there's a lot to see! But THIS scene hit me like a sucker punch in the solarplexis, like very few movies have. I can still hear the scratching of her shoe on the asphalt...

A highly intelligent movie about one very smart kid in a world of violent idiots! So how come guys like Brett Ratner still gets major projects and Boaz Yakin is still relatively unknown?

I'm honestly appalled by a person who would watch this movie and feel for a *beep* dog. To me, what many of the people person posting in this thread are revealing that those children's lives are worth less than an animal.

You might say that I'm taking this far to personally, but in the same respect aren't the people who are expressing sorrow over a dog taking this film a bit to personally.

The little girl is shot, dead, she did nothing to deserve that, a young boy was shot and ended any chance of him growing up and being anything, even a great basketball star because of the jealously of a young man.

I'm saddened to think that anyone would put animal over human beings, let alone children, and if you say this dealing with a film I can only imagine what you think we you see a starving animal on tv as a opposed to children dying of hunger, being raped, kidnapped and so forth.

I'm sorry, some of the things that were said just floored me.

By the way, I agree with everyone on the symbolism of the hanging.

Not to say that I approve of this reason, but I think because he loved the dog so much that he had this mentality like "if I can't have you, noone else can" and he was extremely hurt that he knew he couldn't have the dog anymore so in the moment of extreme pain he thought the best way to get rid of his emotion was to execute the dog.

It's like when you get mad at yourself and find some way to punish yourself (with mental thoughts or physically, maybe).

I didn't like it. I cried. I cried a little harder when the loser shot the little boy and girl on the b-ball court, but it was graphic and I do love animals. Plus I understood what he must've felt. It was really sad. Fresh didn't want to kill his dog.

I haven't read all of the replies so this may have already been addressed.
The way I saw it was: He hanged and shot the dog, a dog he loved, before doing something which was extremely dangerous and required a cold clinical mind from him. I believe he was testing himself to see if he could go through with it.
If he couldn't even kill a dog how could he sit by while he caused Corky to kill Jake, or Esteban to kill James and Corky.
I think in the context he had to test himself so he did "HAVE to hang the dog".

Jesus, people and their stupid fake-dogs getting fake-killed.

REAL HUMAN BEING ACTOR CHILDREN GET ACTOR KILLED IN THIS FILM.. no one says a word.

Meanwhile... A fake dog gets fake hung and fake shot and it's "difficult to watch".

It's not just this film, it's ANY film with ANY fake animal brutality (I COMPLETELY understand someone having a problem with REAL animal brutality, Cannibal Holocaust and whatnot, but no animals were hurt in the production of this!). It's always so "Shocking" and "difficult".

It's just a movie. Like everything else in the movie, it's FAKE!

-
Shuji Terayama forever.

In a movie where numerous PEOPLE die, your upset about a dog?

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When I first watched it I thought it was part of Fresh's plan to take down Jake.

Since Chucky's dog beat the dog Jake was backing in the dogfight, I thought Fresh shot Chucky's dog and left it there as evidence to reinforce a revenge motive in case he needed to prove that Jake killed Chucky.

But having watched it a few more times since then I changed my mind. It seems more likely that because the dog no longer had a home, and Fresh new it would ultimately end up in a bad place (fighting dogs under a new owner, roaming the streets, euthanized, etc.) he put it down to be merciful.

It was also an impactful way to show Fresh's level of commitment to his plan. At that point you know he isn't playing around.