Say What You Need To Say
Movie of the week: “Perfume: The Story of a Murderer” – Warning: SPOILERS!
Ben Whishaw as Jean-Baptiste Grenouille with Karoline Herfurth as the unlucky plum girl
As it has been a good 10 years since I have read Patrick Süskind’s novel “Das Parfum” on which this movie is based, I will refrain from commenting on how well (or badly) it has been adapted to the silver screen. The memory of the book is more than hazy and it probably wouldn’t do “Perfume” justice.
Having said that, it is still quite obvious that “Perfume” has been adapted – there are noticeable time gaps in it which however don’t carry much weight. The movie is almost a little too long as it is with 147 minutes, suffering sometimes from too great a love for close-ups on Grenouille’s nose in an attempt to bring smell closer to the audience. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t – but just seeing all this dirt makes one very happy that the medium does not transmit the stenches of 18th century Paris.
The acting is very good with two notable exceptions: Ben Whishaw as Grenouille is nothing short of perfect, making us recoil in disgust one moment and root for him the next. Rachel Hurd-Wood on the other hand gives a weak performance as the naive daughter of Richis, and even though that is a matter of taste, never strikes me as the beauty everyone tells her to be. In fact I would have liked the first red-headed girl who crosses Grenouille’s path, the hapless plum girl, far better in the role as unattainable Laura – but maybe that’s just me 
. The other supporting actors do a decent job, with only Alan Rickman and Dustin Hoffman both having enough screen time and presence to leave an impression.
Word of mouth has it that “Perfume” is the movie with the biggest budget ever made in Germany, and seeing Paris unfold in all its dirty glory on the screen leaves little doubt to where the money went. The authentic surroundings, including and probably foremost all that filth, add a lot of atmosphere to the chilling story.
The first two thirds of the movie are well-paced and develop nicely, having a thread in Grenouille’s quest for the perfume of perfumes and treading on with grim determination. The last third feels aimless (coincidentally just like its main character?), and especially the orgy seems unnecessarily drawn out. Not that there is much to see except lots of naked buttocks – but maybe that is already too much for some and too little for others .
On the whole, I felt entertained in a very weird way: after all, Grenouille is nothing but a serial killer. Director Tywker succeeds almost a little too well to show us the world from the murderer’s perspective to the point of making the audience his accomplice. Ultimately however this leads to the same emptiness and purposelessness the main character feels – what good is all the beauty if you can’t preserve it?
4 out of 6 Meeps – good
