PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER
RYAN: You know what that smell is? It’s the scent of the film we just saw, “Perfume: The Story of a Murderer.”
CAROLINE: And what an odd film it was.
RYAN: It was odd-ish. I, admittedly, dragged you to this – not kicking and screaming because you were somewhat interested…
CAROLINE: True. Somewhat.
RYAN: Whereas I, from the minute we saw this trailer, wanted to see it because I thought it looked gorgeous and interesting and freaky and spooky. And it is all of those things. But it’s also very, um…
CAROLINE: Long and strange.
RYAN: Yes.
CAROLINE: There’s a lot to enjoy visually in this movie. And there’s nothing wrong with it, per se… I just didn’t care that much about the lead character.
RYAN: Right. For some reason there’s a disconnect and I think ultimately, it’s that the movie is too long. And even though it’s one of the most disgusting movies I’ve ever seen, it’s still beautiful – but it’s bogged down by the length. The director really took his time with each shot, and it’s simply too slow.
CAROLINE: The build-up to the action was excruciatingly long, and they could have lopped several minutes off the beginning.
RYAN: So true.
CAROLINE: The scenes that were too long had Dustin Hoffman in them, and I know it’s exciting when you get Dustin Hoffman in your movie, but you have to use him wisely.
RYAN: It really felt like two separate movies. The first is the story of building the perfect perfume and how that’s made; which is cool. And the second part is just murders. And they don’t really start till halfway through the movie.
CAROLINE: This was directed by Tom Tykwer, the same guy who did “Run Lola Run,” and perhaps that’s why there was so much red hair in the movie.
RYAN: What’s up with him and red hair? Anyway, the performances were really good. The girl who plays one redhead, Laura, Rachel Hurd-Wood, was fantastic.
CAROLINE: And we were thrilled to see that Alan Rickman is in this. Who knew? He’s always great.
RYAN: The lead guy was relatively good at playing creepy.
CAROLINE: He doesn’t have a whole lotta lines.
RYAN: But damn! The make-up all over his body, all the disfiguring sores, were so gross.
CAROLINE: I think you’re making it sound worse than it was. They weren’t lesions or anything. He just had some skin discoloration.
RYAN: Bottom line?
CAROLINE: There were a lot of pretty colors in the film. I liked parts of it more than others. It definitely got weighed down at certain points and I was like, “Ok, let’s move it along!” But then there would be a really good scene, and I’d get back into it. Then it would die down again. So it’s not a great movie. It’s decent, but I
wouldn’t say you have to see it.
RYAN: Totally. It was definitely twenty minutes too long.
CAROLINE: I’d say thirty, but whatever.
RYAN: It had some really interesting twists that we never could have predicted.
CAROLINE: Like how the movie becomes “Hair” at the end?
RYAN: Yes, I didn’t see that coming. But I wanted this movie to have that “Silence of the Lambs” edge-of-your-seat suspense at the end, and it never got anywhere near that level. This is not a must-see.