The sweet smell of success

From its ghastly, fetid beginnings in squalid Paris to the rolling hills of Provence and its outrageously erotic ending, the film of Patrick S¸skind's novel is breathtaking. The climactic scene, for which the book is renowned, is carried off with unexpected panache.

It's been a long hard struggle to bring it to the screen, spanning the 20 years since Perfume was first published in Germany. The book captures the imagination of all who encounter it. It spent nigh on 500 consecutive weeks in the German bestseller charts and has sold more than 15 million copies worldwide. Translated into 45 languages, it has legions of devoted fans, including Nirvana's Kurt Cobain, who cited it as his favourite book, and wrote Scentless Apprentice in its honour.

The irresistible allure of the novel - and now film - stems from the grotesque and vivid depiction of both its era and its principal character, Jean- Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw). He is the central focus, an anti-hero born into the stench of the Paris fish market. As the tale progresses, we realise he has a strangely enhanced sense of smell, but no odour himself, which becomes an obsession. He turns perfumier - and roams France seeking to distil the smell of anything, from doorknob, to pure beauty. This becomes his downfall.

Some of the world's finest directors have lined up to take the project on, only to be defeated. Kubrick pondered the project for years before finally passing on it. Martin Scorsese and Amadeus mastermind Milos Forman also expressed interest; Ridley Scott was attached for the project for some years and most recently, Tim Burton was mooted to be involved. But it fell to the relatively unknown German director Tom Tykwer to succeed where the big guns had failed.

Part of the problem was the author's reluctance to release the rights to the novel. S¸skind was 40 when Perfume was published and already a successful writer for stage and TV. He eschewed the celebrity status that the book's popularity afforded him and, now reclusive, insisted he didn't want to be involved in the film project.

"I don't think S¸skind could imagine anyone who could adapt this material," says Tykwer. It took a friend of the author - film producer Bernd Eichinger - until 2001, and a reported sum of 710 million to persuade him to release the rights. Eichinger is a man with clout and a taste for producing literary fiction.

He's not afraid of controversy, having produced Downfall (about Hitler's last days in the bunker), or adaptations of difficult or ambitious works. Nor did he baulk at the daunting task of having to write the complicated script.

"It was a similar case with The Name of the Rose when Umberto Eco didn't want to participate in the film project," says Eichinger. "But we were finally able to reach an agreement."

So began the task of transposing the insular, brooding text to screen. Astonishingly, the director completed the film within a year. An able hand - as he proved with his energetic and award-winning Run Lola Run (1998) - he tames the unorthodox plot.

The essence of the novel is captured in bone-chilling manner, all subtlety and simmering rage. And though the stellar cast helps, it is Ben Whishaw's pivotal performance that truly shines.

He's already known by theatregoers for his portrayal of Hamlet at the Old Vic - for which he won an Evening Standard award two years ago - but Whishaw's otherworldly portrayal of Grenouille is bound to prove his big-screen breakthrough. We watch him, an obsessive figure of detached dementia throughout, skin-crawlingly blank, only showing emotion when the power of scent takes fiendish hold.

And although his fellow cast members are painfully distinguished, they play their supporting roles with deference. Hoffman - snared by Tykwer with the currency from Run Lola Run, a film the actor championed - is all bumbling brilliance in the cameo role of Guiseppe Baldini, a once-great perfumier who tutors Grenouille in the art of blending scents.

Rickman lends his charisma as Antoine Richis, a wealthy merchant from the perfume-producing town of Grasse, deep in the hills of Provence. Grenouille has travelled there to learn the secrets of perfume, but once there hatches far more sinister plans. These involve Richis's daughter Laure, played by another ascending London star, Rachel Hurd-Wood. The result is a series of mysterious murders which sends the city into hysteria.

As with any screen adaptation, the complex novel has been radically distilled. The book's pivotal section - when Grenouille retreats alone to a cave in the Massif Central where he comes to the devastating conclusion that he has no scent of his own - is abridged to just one scene.

It's left to John Hurt's gravel-throated rumble to take on the task of bridging the gaps. Whishaw is occasionally stifled by these interruptions, but they do add a storybook quality.

Armies of extras are choreographed to conjure bustling cities and writhing ecstasies. And it's all underpinned by a score co-written by the director. But can a film about something as "unfilmable" as smell be a success? Devotees of the book should at least be reassured that Tykwer has been assiduously faithful to S¸skind's original vision and that the film evokes a fascinated revulsion. Meanwhile, a whole new generation of fans may be about to wake up and smell the perfume.