Perfume: The Story Of A Murderer
Truth be told, I had my doubts about this movie before I saw it. With a name like "Perfume", naturally the first thing that came to mind was that I was faced with a chick-flick/thriller. Well, I wasn't completely off the mark. It is a thriller. Based on a Patrick Süskind novel of the same name, or Das Parfum originally, the movie is about a man born with an profound sense of smell who creates the world's finest perfumes, but at a deadly cost. Starring Ben Whishaw, Dustin Hoffman, Alan Rickman, Rachel Hurd-Wood, and directed by Tom Tykwer, the movie is set in 18th century France, quite the smelliest place in the world at the time. Not having read the novel before seeing the movie, I had no idea what I was in for. My girlfriend, who had read the novel earlier, told me that in the novel, the author describes the world of smells as it is seen (or rather, smelled) by Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw) in such a vivid manner that it might be tricky to replicate this onto the big screen. Even the late Stanley Kubrick, who had been interested in adapting the novel abandoned the project because he considered the novel unfilmable. Needless to say, the tricky task of portraying smells in visual form is a daunting task, and for an adaptation of a novel written around the world of smell, the portrayal of smell in this movie is an element which the success of the movie depends upon. If Kubrick deemed it unfilmable, Tom Tykwer is a visual genius. Watching the movie, at times it was as if the audience could smell the visuals, putrid and sweet alike.
As movie adaptations of novels go, the rule of thumb is that the movie rarely follows the novel that well. 'Perfume', seems to be an exception to the rule. True, I haven't read the novel, but I've been informed that the only real difference between the two is that the movie leaves some of the narration out, but is otherwise true to the novel, beginning to end, birth to death.
'Perfume' manages to gross and even scare at times, but most of the time the viewer is mainly mesmerized by the visual splendor and the overwhelmingly menacing manner of the lead character, even when he does nothing or says nothing. That's exactly what makes him so bloody creepy... It's not really a lead character that the viewer can emphasize with. The character Grenouille rarely speaks, spending most of his onscreen time silent, lurking in the shadows, or silently yet efficiently going about his 'trade'. When he does speak, he seems so innocent and humble.
At first, in the portrayal of his miserable, yet satisfying childhood, the viewer feels somewhat sorry for his sorry state, yet is vaguely hesitant of liking him, because of his weirdness.
As a person, Grenouille is at times a nobody, a part of the mass, and at other times he is so weird, creepy and seemingly inhuman. Yet he has this mystical air about him which keeps one captivated as he slaves away at the leathery, or as he is lost in his own world smells. This phenomenal sense of smell and his ability to use it to his advantage amuses and amazes, especially in the scene when where Grenouille meets the out of date perfumer Baldini (Dustin Hoffman) and impresses him in his lab with his acute skill at composing perfumes.
The movie follows the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, born in a fish market, through him finding his passion of life to learn how to capture smell, especially the fleeting smell of virgin beauty, and in doing so create the world's best perfume, albeit through socially unacceptable methods...
In conclusion, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer is a passionate and visually impressive thriller, set in a meticulously well recreated 18th century environment between the putrid stench and miserability of Paris and the picturesque landscapes and element of beautiful Gasse, with it's vivid colors, dark corners and (initially) carefree life, all which gets turned upside down with the arrival of a prospective perfumer with a incredible talent and a secret, murderous dark side, and a passion and goal in life that crosses the line between normal and perversely insane.
I strongly recommend this movie to pretty much everyone, fans of thrillers, of drama, and of really great stories. Now go see it and tell me what you thought.
Sidenote: There's more nudity in this movie than in all the porn movies I've seen to date. I'm not kidding.
For more information on the Author, the Novel and the Movie, see the sources below. (Note: The official website for the movie incorrectly describes it as a movie "...about a man born without a sense of smell...", when he has an inhumanly acute sense of smell, but possesses no personal odor himself. Oops...)
Sources:
IMDb.com
Official Website for the movie
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