Dir.
Tom Tykwer, Germany/France/Spain, 2006, 147 mins Cast: Ben Wishaw, Dustin Hoffman, Alan Rickman, Rachel Hurd-Wood Review by Carol Allen As I haven’t read Patrick Süskind’s
1985 best selling novel, on which this is based, I have no
idea whether the film will please its many fans or not, but
taken just as a piece of screen storytelling this is a brilliantly
original, dark and often ugly tale beautifully told. The
murderer of the title is Jean Baptiste Grenouille (Wishaw),
born into the stinking fish markets of eighteenth century
Paris and immediately abandoned by his mother. But Jean Baptiste
has been given a unique talent - an almost supernatural sense
of smell. He grows into a virtually silent young man, who
experiences the world through his nose - from the smell of
rotting offal to the perfume of life and sexuality, which
is how Jean Baptiste's fate is sealed. One day through the
stink of the city he detects the most beautiful scent. Sniffing
like a hungry dog he tracks down the source, which is the
plum seller (Karoline Herfurth) and in his attempts to get
close to the scent which has so aroused him, he accidentally
kills her. At the point of death her perfume intensifies
and then evaporates and Jean Baptiste has stumbled upon his
vocation - to find a way of capturing that scent, whatever
the human cost. The film evokes the texture of the
times, the muck and the mud, the wet and filthy city and
its inhabitants, while Frank Griebe's sensual cinematography
solves the problem of communicating the smells to us visually
from the rotting fish and vegetables of the city market
to the beauty of the Southern French countryside and its
flowery perfumes later in the story. It also captures the
cruelty of the era, the baying mob and the brutality of
the execution that is planned for Jean Baptiste as a result
of his murderous exploits in his attempts to capture the
perfume of life. Whishaw is terrific as Jean Baptiste, both
sad and repellent with a shambling walk and a face that speaks
volumes, while hardly moving into anything more than the
merest hint of a satisfied smile. And repellent though the
character is in his total lack of any moral sense, he engages
our empathy for his obsession and carries the film with great
power. Although on screen for a comparatively short time,
Hoffman makes a strong impression as Baldini, the heavily
powdered and painted over the hill perfumer, who teaches
Jean Baptiste his art. His testing of perfume is like olfactory
wine tasting and the scene where Jean Baptiste is analysing
for his master the ingredients in the creation of a rival
perfumer has the pace and excitement of a detective story.
Once Jean Baptiste has learned all he needs to know from
Baldini, the story moves to Grasse, centre of perfume industry,
where he begins his search for a way to perfect his own special
formula, a recipe that calls for the captured perfume of
thirteen young girls at the point of death. Essential to
the formula is the fragrantly innocent Laura (Hurd-Wood),
daughter of a local merchant Richis (Rickman), a man of reason
and logic and the only one to suspect the truth. The way
Jean Baptiste extracts his essential human oils from his
victims is vile and his pursuit of Laura and her father’s
efforts to evade him again have the pace of a thriller. The
climax of the film when Jean Baptiste releases his perfume
on the mob attending his execution with a startling, orgiastic
effect is mind blowing with overtones of a Messiah combined
with Hitler. This is a very European film in tone and all the better
for it. Made in English but with little respect for Hollywood
conventions, it's the best film Tykwer has made since his
debut Run Lola Run, while Ben Whishaw, highly acclaimed for
his stage performance as Hamlet two years ago at the Old
Vic in London, seizes his first big movie role and proves
himself potentially a great film actor too.
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