First thoughts.

Taken from the book entitled “perfume” by Patrick Suskind, Perfume - The Story Of A Murderer from first impressions sounded like a good movie to watch, and these first impressions wasn’t wrong.
I hadn’t read the book before, or even heard of the book before I saw the film, however from what I have heard about the book, the film seems to follow the book really well.
From the title “Perfume - The Story Of A Murderer”, I got the clear impression that this movie was about perfume and murders, which is basically true.
From the cover of the DVD you would think that this DVD is older than it is, this is because the actor and actress in the cover look, and are meant to look from the 18th century, as this is what age the film is set in, however the film was released in 2006 which means great video quality which is always something that helps me get more involved in a film which is set in a different century.

Synopsis

In the putrid, rotten Parisian fish market, a mother, already given birth to 5 children gives birth to yet another one underneath her fish stall. His mother who had already had 5 still births surely didn’t expect the child to live and its body be swept away with the fish guts and what ever else creating this horrible smell in the streets of Paris.
However Jean-Baptiste Grenouille chose differently, he chose to live. With his mother leaving him under the fish store, thinking he was already dead, when the baby begins to cry, this cry is heard by the people on the streets of Paris and they label the mother of the child a murderer.
The mother was then sent to the gallows and hung for this supposed crime.

Grenouille is immediately put into care where he stays until he is 13. He is then sold into slavery and the people at the care home also die immediately after selling him.
During the stay here, his passion for smells begins to increase and he runs off one night to find a perfect scent. His nose takes him to a perfume store, where he sees, and smells for the first time what he thinks to be the perfect smell, this is the young virgin female.
He wonders how he could possibly preserve this amazing scent and sets out to learn how to do this.
The great perfumer Giuseppe Baldini takes on Grenouille as an assistant, though it is actually him who creates all these wonderful smells. However he can only tell him the basics of capturing smells and it is only Grenouille himself who can learn how to preserve the smell of the female form he wants.
Its durin this quest that Grenouille goes somewhat insane and takes harsh ways of getting this smell, although you never get the feeling he is ashamed of what he has done, and he no doubt thinks he is creating this smell for a purpose and that purpose has been sent to him from God, like this gift for smell has been given to him too.
Grenouille could have been a great perfumer in his own right if he had followed Giuseppe Baldini and carried on making normal perfumes, but this was just not enough for Grenouille, he got greedy and began to make his own way to find the greatest perfume the world had ever smelt.

Opinion.

Everything about how this film was planned out and carried out so well which is what made the film so good. The setting used and how it was shot really made the place look as dull as it was meant to, and even though its impossible to get a smell through your TV screen, it was really easy to see how bad this place would really smell.
Contrasting with that, the beautiful smells that Grenouille created and smelt over the film were also easy to picture how good they smelt. This is mainly down to the music in the film, the calm music plays as Grenouille smells the beautiful smells and we also can take them in too.

The characters costume and even makeup was finely planned too. They really made the people on the markets of Paris look horrible and they upper class look beautiful. As you carry on watching this, you don’t for one minute remember that this film was actually made in the 2005, and instead you get carried away in this amazing scenery and costume and loose your self and become part of the setting itself.
The thing I most liked about the film was its unpredictability, you really couldn’t tell what was going to happen next in the film and this is something that really helps me get into a film and to find out what’s going to happen. This really is one of those films that if you to watch half of it, you wouldn’t be able to wait to see the second half because you’ll need to know what happens, also your so surprised what happens too, now I wont go into the ending but I don’t think anyone could have guess what would happen at the end of this film

The end is surprising, and perhaps for that I like it although I just don’t think it did the rest of the film justice. Ok so the whole film isn’t really that believable however you do begin to believe it when your watching it, you begin to believe this could actually happen. However the un real end of the film is just a little silly and I think, even if it meant swaying away from the ending in the book they should have finished the film differently.
Even though Grenouille probably didn’t know what he was doing, and its debatable whether or not he deserved to be punished for his crimes or not, I think what happens in the end of this film just doesn’t do justice to his victims and the families of the victims and the smell he has created in the end of the film is just unbelievable and unreal.

Cast

Ben Whishaw- as Jean-Baptiste Grenouille carries the character very well. He gives this impression that Jean-Baptiste Grenouille really doesn’t regret anything he does and has an attitude to life that makes him never seem scared of anything or anyone. He makes the character seems innocent as well as guilty at all times and sometimes we even feel sorry for Grenouille as Bens innocence really comes out in this character.

Dustin Hoffman- as the great perfumer Giuseppe Baldini who employs Grenouille to make perfumes for him is a believable character in himself, when watching the film we don’t doubt for one second who he is and has got a kind of legendary, but desperate look to him.

Rachel Hurd-Wood- as Laura Richis, the woman Grenouille thinks will make his smell complete, has been given this beautiful innocent role to play. This is the last of Grenouille’s victims and the story focuses on her more than the others as she is the most protected and hardest to get to out of all the victims within the story, but she is also the daughter of Antoine Richis who’s main attention is not only protecting his daughter but also capturing Jean-Baptiste Grenouille.

Alan Rickman- as Antoine Richis brings a loving and protecting fatherly role to his character in this film. Also he brings a powerful role to the character too, he does try his best to protect his daughter but proably gets too carried away in capturing Grenouille rather than protecting his daughter.

Crew

Director - Tom Tykwer .
Narrator - Tom Tykwer.
Music - Tom Tykwer.
Johnny Klimek.
Reinhold Heil.
Producer - Bernd Eichinger.
Written by - Patrick Süskind .
Screen writers - Tom Tykwer
Bernd Eichinger.
Andrew Birkin.
Cinematography - Frank Griebe .
Editor - Alex Berner.
Costume designer - Pierre-Yves Gayraud.

Extra features

The Making Of Perfume documentary - this gives a great look behind the scenes of the making of perfume, showing the sets how it was shot and its surprising to see how much effort went into the costume and makeup of the actors/actresses in the film.
Location Scouting featurette - this is a quite short featurette taking you into the scenes of the actual location of the film, with interviews with tom tykwer.
Scent Visualisation featurette - this highlights the difficulties that tom had when trying to get the scent into the big screen, it shows how he manages to get the scent across to everyone who watches the film.
Director Of Photography featurette - fantastic featurette with interviews from director of photography Frank Griebe.
Mixing Stage featurette.
Behind-the-scenes photo gallery.
Theatrical trailer- this is the trailer that was played in theatres to advertise perfume, and its actually really good, I don’t recognise actually seeing this trailer which is probably why I never watched this at the cinema.

Final thoughts.

Altogether this is quite a thought provoking film, its defiantly one I advise watching, however its one you might be disappointed in because of the ending of the film. I prefer watching realistic films and that’s what’s put me off the ending of this film, however if your not too bothered about this, then maybe you would actually enjoy the ending of this film.
I cant help but thinking this is somewhat of a religious film, there is however little talk of religion in the film however this Grenouille character has a Christ like impression put upon him.
At the beginning of the film we learn, “Thus, the first sound to escape Grenouilles lips, sent his mother to the gallows”. his mother was killed, and its very important to notice that anyone who abandoned him in the film, or let him leave them was immediately killed, or died. I’m not sure why it was done in this was, except to portray Grenouille as a Christ like figure, who has the power of god behind him, so that anyone who deserted him was punished and killed by God perhaps. This also ties in with the unrealistic ending, as if Grenouille’s character is saved by God because of this amazing talent for scent that he has given him, but whether or not this is true, and no matter how hard the ending may be to get your head around, this is an all round fantastic film.