Perfume – The Story of A Murderer
Posted on November 29, 2009
Filed Under Movies, Perfume - The Story of A Murderer | 9 Comments
If you haven’t seen the movie yet, here’s the plot (source: Wikipedia.org)
Set in 18th century France, the film tells the story of an olfactory genius, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw) and his homicidal quest for the perfect scent.
The film begins with the sentencing of Grenouille, a notorious murderer. Between the reading of the sentence and the execution, the story of his life is told in flashback, beginning with his abandonment at birth in a French fish market. Raised in an orphanage, Grenouille grows into a strangely detached boy with a superhuman sense of smell. After growing to maturity as a tanner’s apprentice, he makes his first delivery to Paris, where he revels in the new odors. He focuses on a girl selling plums (Karoline Herfurth) and startles her with his behavior. To prevent her from crying out, he covers the girl’s mouth and unintentionally suffocates her. After realising that she is dead, he strips her body naked and smells her until the scent fades. Afterwards, Grenouille becomes haunted by the desire to preserve scents forever.
After making a delivery to a perfume shop, Grenouille amazes the owner, Giuseppe Baldini (Dustin Hoffman), with his ability to create fragrances. He revitalises the perfumer’s career with new formulas, demanding only that Baldini teach him how to convert scents into perfume. Baldini explains that all perfumes are harmonies of twelve individual scents, and may contain a theoretical thirteenth scent. He also tells a story about a perfume discovered in an Egyptian tomb that was so perfect that it affected the entire world the moment the bottle was opened. However, when Grenouille discovers that Baldini’s method will not capture all scents, he becomes depressed and leaves to learn superior methods in Grasse. En route to Grasse, Grenouille realises that he has no scent of his own, and is therefore a cipher. He decides that creating the perfect smell will prove his worth.
Grenouille finds work in Grasse assisting with perfumes. After some experimenting, he succeeds in preserving the scent of a woman by cutting her hair, covering her in animal fat, and then distilling the fat. To force the woman to undergo the procedure, however, he must kill her. Grenouille embarks on a killing spree, murdering beautiful virgins and capturing their scents. He dumps the girls’ naked corpses around the city, creating an uproar that threatens to tear the city apart. Nearing completion, Grenouille selects a beautiful young lady, Laura (Rachel Hurd-Wood), for his thirteenth scent, the lynchpin of his perfect perfume. Laura’s wealthy father, Antoine Richis (Alan Rickman) realises the danger and attempts to flee the city with his daughter. Grenouille tracks her scent to a roadside inn and sneaks into her room that night. The next morning, Richis discovers Laura lying dead in her bed.
Soldiers capture Grenouille moments after he finishes preparing his perfume. On the day of his execution, he applies a drop of the perfume to himself. The executioner and the crowd in attendance are overwhelmed by the beauty of the perfume. They declare Grenouille innocent before falling into an orgy. Walking out of Grasse unscathed, Grenouille has enough perfume to rule the world, but has discovered that it will not allow him to love or be loved like a normal person. He returns to the Parisian fish market where he was born and empties his perfume bottle over his head. Overcome by the scent, the nearby crowd devours him. The next morning, one final drop of perfume falls from the open bottle.
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I absolutely loved this film too. It took me a while to watch it as the book was one of my favourite books ever. But I’m glad I did eventually get around to it.
It is actually a wonderfully colourful film with excellent cinematography so if you ever get a chance to see it on a bigger screen, then I’d recommend it!
I definitely agree.
I wonder why I didn’t hear about this movie until now. I wish I’ll have a chance to watch this inside a movie theater but I’m not sure if they’ll show this movie again. 
I will try to find this movie. It would be an interesting movie to watch. Thanks for the feedback on it.
I guarantee you won’t regret it.
Ha! There are so many films that I missed while they were on circuit and will never get to see in a theatre now. When I was gorwing up, it seemed there were a couple more cinemas that showed older films but I guess that isn’t economically viable these days.
The orgy part was kinda weird to me. Still, the flow of the story certainly supports it. Altho, if it happens in real life, I’ll puke if I see such open orgyness. :D
He should’ve given me the perfume instead of emptying it all on his head and die from it. After killing all those innocent girls.. Bah!
I am definitely bookmarking this page and sharing it with my friends.
that’s really nice. thank you for visiting my blog
i love this movie.. i was amazed how the makers of the film made Grenouille look like he’s the antagonist and the protagonist at the same time. i found out about it just last week too..