DUSTIN HOFFMAN - MOVIE REVIEWS: PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER

MOVIE REVIEWS: PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER

Among the films being released in a few theaters so that it could qualify for Oscar nominations before the end of the year was Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, starring Dustin Hoffman, Ben Whishaw and Alan Rickman. But the picture, some reviews suggest, may be too arty for its own good. Jan Stuart in Newsday is impressed with the film's "tumultuous" opening scenes and a "stunner" of an ending. However, he concludes, between those scenes, it's "a bit of a drag." Claudia Puig in USA Today sums up: "stunningly rendered, disturbing to watch, perverse and, ultimately, emotionally hollow." A.O. Scott writes in the New York Times: "Try as it might to be refined and provocative, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer never rises above the pedestrian creepiness of its conceit." On the other hand, Lou Lumenick writes in the New York Post that while the movie has a "hollywood-sized budget" of $67 million, "it's European to the very core." It is, he writes, "so visually vivid you can practically smell many of the scenes." And Jack Mathews comments in the New York Daily News that Perfume "is worth every scent."



01/01/2007