Perfume - The story of a murderer is an adaptation on Patrick Süskind's book of the same title (German originally, though), which was created in German-French-Spanish co-production and directed by Tom Tykwer who also had his share in the screenplay writing and music.

Cast of main characters:

Jean-Baptiste Grenouille - Ben Whishaw
Madame Gaillard - Sian Thomas
Grimal - Sam Douglas
Giuseppe Baldini - Dustin Hoffman
Madame Arnulfi - Corinna Harfouch
Laura - Rachel Hurd-Wood
Laura's Father - Alan Rickman

Movie play time: 2 hours 15 minutes
Certification: 12 (Czech rep.), 15 (UK etc).
Generally, the film does contain nudity and violence, the violence has no sexual meaning, you can't see a naked male body and nude females are pretty subtle in my opinion (including the "orgy" scene, it is more love-making to me, if you understand the difference). Violence as in kicks, someone in chains and little bit of water torture (I expected a way wider range of torture methods) with no stress on such scenes, doesn't seem inapropriate to me. This is the kind of a drama/thriller I love, no buckets of blood neccessary to make your skin crawl, it provokes your own imagnation.

At a glance
A dark and murky chamber story that most of all takes place in its main character's mind and perception, as this guy, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille lives in a completely different world none of us can get the grasp of, pardon my slight exagerration. It' not a main character you could project yourself into, so there's a need of a narrator, who guides you through the story as you watch Grenouille doing his thing, which is what he does, unlike talking. During the whole movie he hardly utters a word at all, besides when he essentially needs it, so the only big talking scene of his is when he comes to Baldini's house to prove his skills so that he can become his apprentice. This boy who has only been treated rough by life and escaped therefore into his own world of perfumes develops a pathological obssession by scents so strong he has to kill for it.

I've read the book ages ago and it was outstanding among the hundreds of books I've ever read. I've written this review targetting people who either have read the book or seen the movie already, so I expect you knowing the story and tell all of it here. In case you haven't read/seen it yet and you want to, I advice you either not to read further or skip at least the catastrophe paragraph.

Settings
The story takes place in the dirt of the lower social class in France of 18th century, starting in Paris to move to Grasse for the crucial part of the critical phase, to return back to Paris for the catastrophe. The settings are beautifully simple and if you weren't told this was Paris, you wouldn't even know because all you see of it is the fish market and narrow dirty lanes which make you shiver by smelling like hell through your screen. No Louvre, no Versailles, no Notre Dame, not a single piece of Paris' beauty to disturb the ugliness.

Storyline

Besides the very beginning of the film, where we meet Grenouille as a prisoner waiting for his sentence, the story perfectly maintains the composition of the antic drama, so I'll follow its sequence.

Exposition:
Main character is introduced here. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was born on 17th July 1738 on the fish market, into dirt and abandonment, which was supposed to lead to his extinction, however, he showed an effort to stay alive and that cost his mother her life. This is a pattern we will continue to watch several times during the movie, as all people who gained any profit through Grenouille weren't able to savour it for a long time. Ever since he entered a society (Madame Gaillard's orphanage, in his case), he was a loner and as we'll see soon, he became a wolf, too.

In his teens Madame Gaillard has sold him to Grimal, a tanner, in whose workshop Grenouille worked until reaching his adult age. He was quiet, seemed shy and he enjoyed being on his own, so that he could roam the world using his unique ability - a nose so sensitive it could distinguish any scent and also remember it forever. He was incredibly efficient and successful at conforming to rules and he knew how to please, so that he'd be left alone. Soon in his life he realized he couldn't share his joy of smelling scents with others, so that people didn't matter to him at all and consequently, he didn't find it neccessary to talk to them. However, he wasn't meant to live only with his scents, apart from the society.

Colision:
The first clash with law in Grenouille's so far peaceful, even if harsh, life came when he fell in love, you could say. However, his was a different kind of craving as he didn't have sexual needs, his needs were for owning the most beautiful scent he knew, even if he could remember it once he'd smelt it, he had to own it, too.
His first victim that kicked off his urge for women's body scents was actually killed without Grenouille intending this to happen, he only didn't understand the consequence of his action as he caught her scent and traced her back to the lonely arcade. He was crazed by her scent and he had to have it, but only after killing her he realized he wasn't able to take it away from her, which left him desperate.

Crisis:
Grenouille discovers the professional world of perfume industry and realizes it might be a way to obtain what he so yearns for - the perfect perfume. For the first time he actively works on his career as he takes the advantage of delivering lamb skins to a once famous perfume maker Baldini and unlike himself he's bold enough to show his skills in perfume cognition and also production. He proves to be successful even if Baldini's shocked by Grenouille's clumsiness and boyish inexperienced simpleness, however Baldini can see a huge talent in this boy, which might be his chance for a major comeback into the perfume industry and to destroy his competitors. Baldini also considers himself to be outsmarting this youth who can be used easily, but in fact it's Grenouille who takes advantage of Baldini to learn the theory of perfume making from him.

Important for the story is that Baldini told Grenouille a legend of an ultimate essence, which, if ever found, would crown the 12 contents of a perfume and this has set Grenouille out for the mission of finding and owning it. However, when he finds out Baldini's knowledge is not enough to secure his goal, he leaves Baldini and moves to Grasse to learn more.

In Grasse he works at Madame Arnulfi's workshop and learns how to preserves perfumes. Coldblooded as he is in his mind of a serial killer, he soon starts experimenting with young women's bodies and finds himself successful to conserve their scent into an essence. Even if taking a huge risk of being uncovered in his scary hobby, he uses the workshop's equipment for this purpose and as bold as he is, the luck is with him and he could laugh at the police trying to capture the serial killer, if he'd care to.

He follows a simple pattern, his victims are young, beautiful and most of them virgins and he seems not to make a difference in their origin, but there is one who is special to him, a local noble's daughter Laura. She is the legendary ultimate essence that rounds off the set of twelve essences Grenouille has won so far and she's also the most difficult one to get as he almost had his hands on her a couple of times, but a accident saved her. Unfortunately, the beautiful Laura's not meant to be saved in the end, no matter how hard her father tried, Grenouille manages to steal his daughter literary from under his nose.

As incredibly invisible and lucky as he is while getting to her and killing her, he's most oblivious to the police and drowned in his lust he doesn't care to hide with his spoils. Just before being captured he managed to mix the 13 essences creating The Perfume, which will come to have its word in the story.

Grenouille's sentenced to slowly die after a brutal execution to be taken place in front of a chanting crowd of he people of Grasse who hate him to the last bit, Laura's father among them to secure Grenouille's punishment.

Peripeteia:
Grenouille uses his Perfume to drug his captors as he's being led to the execution place and he appears immaculately dressed to the crowd, wearing his Perfume, which numbs them all to the point of loving Grenouille. As he sprays more of the Perfume to the crowd, they become overwhelmed by the feeling of love and an overall orgy (beautiful, however) takes place. The only one who seems not to be fooled is Laura's father, but as he approaches Grenouille who stands defenseless in front of him, he also falls for the Perfume and cries of love to Grenouille. Grenouille is saved and he rushes back to Paris.

Catastrophe:
At this point it wasn't clear to me if what happened next was Grenouille's intention or not, but what is sure is that he has created a golem, as godly as the invention of his was, it has become equally deadly and fatal to its creator.
Jean-Baptiste Grenouille returned to his birth-place, the stinky fish market, to pour himself with The Perfume and its power intrigued the riffraff so strongly that every person present felt an unstoppable urge to own a piece of Grenouille to satisfy their need for beauty coming out of him, so they literary ripped him into pieces until nothing was left.

Now it's time for catharsis, so I will let you savour it, thank you for reading.