Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7022 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-07-24
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: AC-3, Dolby, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 147 minutes

Review
Releasing a costume epic in the thick of Oscar season is a calculated risk -- it can pay big dividends in terms of prestige-by-proximity, but if it doesn't get marketed as an outside-the-box genre buster, it'll just get buried. This was the unfortunate fate of Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, which should have also gotten more attention because it came from Tom Tykwer, the writer/director of the enthralling Run Lola Run. Remarkably, Perfume is an equally original work. Simply put, when was the last time you saw a film about the sense of smell? It would seem a cinematic mismatch, but Tykwer uses every narrative gift at his disposal to give a deeply rich and palpable visualization to the olfactory themes. When Dustin Hoffman's perfumer uncorks the divine scent spontaneously conjured by his apprentice, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw), his laboratory morphs into a lush digital garden for the time the scent lingers in the air. Perfume is peppered with such inspired methods of communicating smells, both delicious and repugnant, and their potential to overwhelm. As if tackling this overlooked sense weren't enough, Tykwer also may be the first filmmaker to delve into the mysterious art of making perfume. That gets its procedural day in the sun through another set of fascinating sequences. But what may be most impressive about Tykwer's film is that it is so different from anything he's ever made. Run Lola Run showcased one kind of brilliance, but here, Tykwer nearly eschews Lola's jittery aesthetic in favor of a grand period opulence that's languidly paced and deliberate. One wouldn't even know it was the same director but for the rare signature touch. (And it's worth noting, when praising Tykwer, that he and collaborators Reinhold Heil and Johnny Klimek composed this film's period-appropriate music, just as they composed Lola's techno soundtrack.) With gorgeous cinematography by Frank Griebe and a trio of art directors working overtime, the alternating grubbiness and glamour of 18th century France pops off the screen, from the fish-strewn marketplaces of Paris to the palatial mansions of Grasse. Some viewers may have a hard time adjusting to Hoffman in a powdered wig, and he does sometimes distract, though his role is relatively minor (as is that of the always good Alan Rickman). But Whishaw makes a profoundly unknowable protagonist -- a loner orphan gifted with a supernatural sense of smell, who uses killing merely as a means of attempting to bottle the perfect scent. Tykwer makes grand gestures in this film, most notably the brilliantly executed climax and its jaw-dropping use of extras. Those who frowned on Perfume may have attacked scenes like this one, which go over the top in adhering to the film's status as a dark fairy tale that knows it couldn't really exist. But anyone who appreciates errors of ambition will surely forgive Tykwer, especially once they get swept up in his spell of smell. ~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide

On the DVD
The Story of Perfume

Synopsis
An obsessive French perfumer with a highly developed olfactory sense and an all-consuming drive to capture the essence of love eventually resorts to murder in his unrepentant quest to find the key ingredient for his recipe in director Tom Tykwer's adaptation of author Patrick Suskind's best-selling 1985 novel. Born in a fetid fish market and raised in a dilapidated orphanage, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw) toiled his childhood away in a rank tannery run by the thuggish Grimal (Sam Douglas). Subsequently obsessed by smell, Grenouille's keen olfactory sense becomes so finely tuned that it eventually overpowers such human qualities as love and compassion. Though he has indeed discovered the unmistakable scent of a woman, Grenouille finds it impossible to connect with the fairer sex on any sort of meaningful level. Roaming the streets of Paris late one night, Grenouille catches the scent of a young girl selling plums and impulsively strangles her, later sniffing her nude corpse in a twisted attempt to preserve the distinctive scent in his memory. After persuading legendary perfumer Giuseppe Baldini (Dustin Hoffman) to take him on as an apprentice, Grenouille travels to the town of Grasse in Southern France in order to learn the art of enfleurage at a firm run by the highly respected Mme. Arnulfi (Corinna Harfouch). It is there that Grenouille becomes dangerously drawn to the vestal aroma of the young and beautiful Laura (Rachel Hurd-Wood), the daughter of widower merchant Antione Richis (Alan Rickman). Soon driven to madness by such a pure scent, the spellbound Grenouille continues to claim the lives of the numerous young girls in a tragic attempt to bottle the impossibly elusive smell of virginal womanhood. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Customer Reviews

Scent of desire
How exactly do you make a movie about smells? After all, a movie is all about sight and sound. Touch, taste and smell rarely come into it.

But acclaimed German director Tom Tykwer manages to make us smell things, in his most disturbing movie to date, "Perfume: The Story of a Murderer." This time around, the talented Tykwer abandons his usual lovers-against-the-world stories for a lushly-filmed, darkly comic story of olfactory obsession. Yes, that is what I said.

Jean-Baptiste Grenouillle (Ben Whishaw) is a man with a brilliant sense of smell, and zero body odor. He was born in a putrid fishmarket, raised in an orphanage, and later escapes from a tannery where he was working. He's enraptured by the many thrilling smells in the city -- he even kills a young girl, so that he can smell her lovely scent.

In his search for the perfect scent, Jean-Baptiste gets a job with a once-famed perfume-maker (Dustin Hoffman). But after learning that not everything has a scent, he begins killing women to try to distill their scents into the ultimate perfume -- with beautiful redhead Laura (Rachel Hurd-Wood) as the "thirteenth scent." But his ultimate scent has an even more sinister side, as his scents begin to affect the population in unusual ways.

"Perfume" is Tykwer's most unique movie to date, and the one that definitely identifies him as a cinematic master. There are lots of music that are evocative, sensual, colourfully beautiful, or unspeakably creepy, but not many manage to be all of them. "Perfume: The Story of a Murderer" is all of those, and more.

Obviously a movie doesn't smell like anything, except maybe stale popcorn. So Tykwer uses sight for smell -- rotted fish, maggots, moldy walls from the late 1700s to show Jean-Baptiste's miserable origins. And he uses sparkling colour and windblown trees for nicer scents. Colour takes the place of scent itself -- bright red Lola hair on multiple girls, flowers that seem to pop out of the screen, fresh leaves, brilliant fruits, even brightly coloured food. It gives the visuals a fairy-tale vibrancy.

In fact, the scripting almost comes second to the exquisite cinematography. Yet Tykwer is able to bring across the powerful symbolism that brings the movie to life -- the smells are symbolic of love itself, which the scentless and amoral Jean-Baptiste does not have. He can only try to take it from others, with a finale that is the very image of poetic justice.

Jean-Baptiste himself is one of those love/hate characters, and Whishaw does an excellent job with his sort of half-crazy, intent stare. And there are some great supporting performances by Alan Rickman as Antoine Richis (Laura's dad) and Hoffman as the eccentric old perfume-maker -- he adds a welcome note of comedy.

A movie is dependent on sight, but Tom Tykwer creates a movie that you can almost smell. "Perfume: The Story of a Murderer" is darkly comic, bizarrely beautiful movie, and definitely worth seeing.

decent screen adaptation
Orphan, Jean Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw) develops a special olfactory sense. After working in a tannery, he discovers the city and meets a girl that inebriates his senses. He then realizes that he has a destiny. He soon meets perfume-maker Baldini (Dustin Hoffman) and will reproduce perfumes for him. However, his work will take a dark turn as his search deepens for the ultimate scent.

While the book is very vivid and calls for the reader's imagination regarding the smells, and accurately describes the olfactory senses and odors one might encounter, the film obviously lacks this reproduction. (It *is* difficult to transfer odor on film! so this was to be expected.) Also, the book was more shocking than the movie probably because of the strong description of smells, and violent details.

That said, the film is nevertheless watchable, despite Hoffman's terrible overacting interpretation. Whishaw is a good casting choice as Grenouille, he is well directed and is not too much a "pretty boy" for the part.

The costumes, the period details, the images, the music - they do help in experiencing atmosphere, but it still rather limited because of the lack of correct interpretation or transcription of smells to the screen.

Worth watching once. For the sheer beauty of the photography work.

NOTE: I still recommend reading the book, whether before or after the film that is your choice. But read the book. A totally different experience.

A Creepy Movie
This has become part of our annual Halloween assortment. My husband and I saw the trailer on another odd movie we came across, but we thought it looked so unusual we just had to see if we could find a copy! And we did.
Neither of us had read the book. We just really enjoy the cinematography and the story line. The costumes are very well done and how the filth of the time period is portrayed seems very accurate!
It has become a must-see for our friends and family members.