Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (film)

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer is a 2006 period psychological thriller film directed by Tom Tykwer, who cowrote the screenplay with Andrew Birkin and Bernd Eichinger, based on the 1985 novel of the same name by Patrick Süskind. The film stars Ben Whishaw, Alan Rickman, Rachel Hurd-Wood and Dustin Hoffman. Set in 18th-century France, the film tells the story of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Whishaw), an olfactory genius, and his homicidal quest for the perfect scent.

Producer Eichinger bought the film rights to Süskind's novel in 2000, and began writing the screenplay together with Birkin. Tykwer was selected as the director, and joined the two in developing the screenplay in 2003. Principal photography began July 12, 2005, and concluded October 16, 2005. Filming took place in Spain, Germany and France. The film was made on a budget of €50 million (est. $60 million), making it one of the most expensive German films.

A co-production of Germany, France, Spain and the United States, Perfume was released September 14, 2006, in Germany by Constantin Film, December 26, 2006, in the United Kingdom by Pathé Distribution, and December 27, 2006, in the United States by DreamWorks Pictures. It grossed more than $135 million worldwide, of which more than $53 million was made in Germany. Critics gave the film mixed reviews. The visual style and performances of Rickman and Whishaw were predominantly praised, while the unevenness of the screenplay and casting of Hoffman were criticized.

The film begins with the sentencing of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a notorious murderer. The story of his life is told in flashback. He is seen born and abandoned in a French fish market by his mother, who is almost immediately hanged. 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 all the new scents. He is particularly enchanted by a redheaded girl selling yellow plums, following her and attempting to sniff her, but he startles her with his behavior. To prevent her from crying out, he covers her mouth and unintentionally suffocates her. After realizing she is dead, he strips her naked and smells her all over, becoming distraught when her scent fades. Afterward, he is haunted by the desire to recreate her aroma.

When making a delivery to a perfume shop, Grenouille amazes the Italian owner, Giuseppe Baldini, with his ability to create fragrances. He revitalizes the perfumer's career with new formulas, demanding only that Baldini teach him how to preserve scents. Baldini explains that all perfumes are harmonies of twelve scents, and may contain a theoretical thirteenth scent. Grenouille is saddened to learn that Baldini's method of distillation will not capture the scents of all objects (or rather, people). Baldini informs Grenouille of another method in Grasse, and provides him the journeyman papers in exchange for 100 new perfume formulas. Immediately after Grenouille departs, however, Baldini dies when his shaky apartment building collapses with him in it. En route to Grasse, Grenouille decides to exile himself from society, taking refuge in a cave. During this time, he discovers that he himself lacks any personal scent, and he believes this is why he is perceived as strange or disturbing by others. Deciding to continue his quest, he leaves his cave.

On arrival in Grasse, he catches the scent of Laure Richis, the redheaded daughter of the wealthy Antoine Richis, and decides that she will be his "thirteenth scent", the linchpin of his perfume. He finds a job and learns the method of enfleurage. He starts experimenting by first killing a young woman and attempting to extract her scent using hot enfleurage, which fails. He attempts cold enfleurage on a prostitute he murders, and successfully preserves her scent. Having perfected his method, he embarks on a killing spree, targeting young women and capturing their scents. He dumps their naked corpses around the city, creating panic. After preserving the first twelve scents, he plans his attack on Laure. Worried about his daughter's safety, Richis flees the city with her, but Grenouille tracks her scent to a seaside inn and murders her while Richis is asleep.

Soldiers capture Grenouille moments after he finishes preparing his perfume. On the day of his execution, he applies the perfume on himself. The executioner and the crowd are speechless at the intoxicating scent; they declare Grenouille innocent before falling into a massive orgy. Richis approaches him with his sword, but is overwhelmed by the scent and embraces Grenouille as his son. Walking out of Grasse unscathed, Grenouille has enough perfume to rule the world, but has discovered that it cannot help him to love nor be loved like a normal person. Disenchanted by his aimless quest, he returns to the Parisian fish market where he was born and pours the remaining perfume over his head. Overwhelmed by the scent, the nearby crowd devours him. The next morning, all that is left are his clothes and the perfume bottle, out of which one final drop falls.

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer is based on the 1985 novel by Patrick Süskind, which has sold over 20 million copies worldwide. Süskind reportedly thought that only Stanley Kubrick and Miloš Forman could do the book justice, and refused to let anyone else adapt it to film. Bernd Eichinger, the film's producer, read the novel when it was first released, and immediately approached Süskind (who was also a friend) to obtain the film rights; Süskind refused. In 2000, Süskind relented and sold the rights to Eichinger. Eichinger had to take out a personal loan because the supervisory board of Constantin Film refused to approve the selling price. He is rumored to have paid €10 million for the film rights. The author had no involvement in the project. Artist-director Julian Schnabel wanted to direct a film version of the novel, and wrote a script based on the novel. However, Eichinger, who owned the rights to the novel at the time, disliked Schnabel's stream of consciousness-driven narrative of the story, and that project never materialized. Schnabel eventually transferred his approach to his Perfume script to his 2007 film, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

Eichinger and screenwriter Andrew Birkin began to write a draft script. Eichinger says that their biggest problem was a narrative one. "The main character doesn't express himself. A novelist can use narrative to compensate for this; that's not possible in film. An audience can usually only get a feeling for a character if the character speaks," said Eichinger. "With material like this it is especially important for a director to get involved in the script." Eichinger met with a number of directors, but felt that only Tom Tykwer was really in tune with the material. In 2003, Tykwer was invited to join Eichinger and Birkin in adapting the novel. The screenplay went through more than 20 revisions to get to the final shooting script. The three writers worked hard to create a faithful adaptation that captured the atmosphere and climate of the novel, yet, at the same time, have a specific and individual perspective, in terms of the story and the main character.

The film had a production budget of €50 million (US$63.7 million), making it one of the most expensive German film productions. The film was financed by Constantin Film, of which Eichinger was the former CEO, billionaire Gisela Oeri and VIP Medienfonds. Perfume was Oeri's first investment in a film, and she also served as a co-producer. The film received €200,000 in funding from the German Federal Film Board (FFA)'s German–French Agreement fund. Eurimages also granted the film €600,000 in co-production funding. The film received €400,000 in funding from the German Federal Film Board. The film received production funding of €1.6 million from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, €1 million from the German Federal Film Board and €750,000 from Filmstiftung NRW. The film received distribution funding of €205,000 from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, €180,000 from the German Federal Film Board and €150,000 from the Bavarian Bank Fund.

Andreas Schmid, CEO of VIP Medienfonds ("Medienfonds" is a German term for a type of closed investment fund) and one of the film's executive producers, was arrested in October 2005 on suspicion of fraud and tax evasion. The resulting investigation revealed some irregularities in the financing of Perfume, suggesting that some investors may have invested in the film as a vehicle for tax evasion (to acquire tax losses). According to documents Schmid filed to tax authorities, VIP invested €25 million into the film. However, according to Constantin Film's ledgers, VIP put up only €4.1 million. The remainder of the €25 million was banked to collect interest, secure bank guarantees, and to pay back investors their share of the film's revenue. Due to VIP's claim that the whole €25 million was used to produce the film, its investors were also able to write off their entire contribution against tax. Perfume also received €700,000 in state subsidies from Filmstiftung NRW, based on the €4.1 million figure. In November 2007, Schmid was found guilty of multiple counts of tax evasion and sentenced to six years in prison. He had already served more than two years in jail since his arrest.

Filming was originally planned to begin in the third quarter of 2004, but the filmmakers had trouble finding the right actor to play the protagonist, Grenouille. The search to find an actor to play Grenouille took nearly a year. On casting agent Michelle Guish's advice, Tykwer went to see Ben Whishaw perform as Hamlet in Trevor Nunn's production of the play. Tykwer immediately felt that he had found the actor for the role. An audition followed that convinced Eichinger of Whishaw's potential. Eichinger described Whishaw as embodying both "the innocent angel and the murderer". Regarding his search to find an actor, Tykwer said, "It only really seemed plausible to choose someone for this role who was completely unknown. You could also say a 'nobody' who is to become a 'somebody' - because that's what the story is about too."