The story takes place in 18th century France.
It starts in Paris and ends in Paris.
The hero Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was born in the filthiest and most fetid place in Paris - the fish market, but his mother dumped him in the garbage, and because of this he His mother was pushed to the gallows.
As a baby, he was kept in an orphanage. When he grew up a little, he began to gradually discover that he had an unusually sensitive sense of smell and could distinguish between different odors. When he was 13 years old and the orphanage could no longer accommodate him, he was sold by the dean to a tanner, and he has lived a life inferior to horses. This leather shop, which can knock down a person in five years, has not knocked down Grenouille. He has a tenacious vitality like a cockroach. Just like his unusual sense of smell.
He could smell all kinds of smells and remember them one by one. He was able to become an apprentice by showing his extraordinary talent in front of perfumers, but Grenouille was not satisfied with making perfumes. He wanted to retain the smell, to capture the smell. When his apprenticeship expired, he came to Grasse, the birthplace of perfume, with a letter of recommendation from his master. He realized that he had no taste of his own, and that he did not exist in this world without a taste.
After that, young girls were killed in the small town. They all had their long hair cut off and were naked, but they were not sexually assaulted. There is no doubt that Grenouille did it. In order to realize his ambition to create a soul-stirring aroma that is unique in the world, he did not hesitate to kill those young and beautiful girls.
In the end, as in all stories, the so-called evil cannot overcome justice, he was caught, and was about to be hanged on the gallows, crucified, and died in the angry eyes of tens of thousands of people. But when the story goes here, there is a big reversal that no one expected. Grenouille put some perfume made from the body fragrance of those 25 girls on his neck before being executed. Everyone who wanted him to die was all bowed down to him, and even the mayor who had lost his beloved daughter was lost in the soul-sweeping aroma in the end. At this time, Grenouille saw the fruit-selling girl whom he had met by the Seine. He seemed to see her turn around with a charming smile and embraced him; he seemed to be able to smell the fragrance of the girl again. ; he seems to be able to vaguely see the girl's bewitching eyes...
Looking at the carnival crowd in the square, he realized something in an instant, he finally knew what the feeling in his heart was when he looked at the girl, he finally realized that he had been struggling to find the ultimate satisfaction, thinking that he had found it, but he had not found it. What is the thing, he finally understands what he wants to try his best to keep, called love. However, he has long lost the ability to love people, probably because he has never been loved by others, even if it is just a simple greeting, he has never received it. Therefore, poor Grenouille did not understand love. Since he accidentally killed the girl who sold fruit, he was destined to embark on this irreversible road of no return-the road of no return to collect aromas, and finally became everyone. The killer in the eyes, a devil.
Perhaps, as the Pope said, "He is not a man, he is an angle!" Yes, since he killed the first maiden, he was not human, but not an angel either. He lost the emotions that human beings should have, and the ability to love people. To love and be loved, for him, is a luxury. It turned out that his life was still so unbearable. It turned out that the man named Grenoye never existed. A tear slipped down Grenouille's face, the only tear in his life. If so, why not end it? So he returned to the place where he was born, the dirty fish market in Paris, with the memory of smell. In front of a crowd of robbers, thieves, stowaways, assassins and prostitutes, he counted the bottle of perfume from the top of his head, waiting for those people to swarm up and end his humble life. In this way, he came to the world and walked for a while, and he came and went in a hurry.
And perfume, which is an important prop in the movie, is not just perfume.
Perfume is a substance, so it can also be extended to various other substances, an objective existence that can be seen by the naked eye.
We can immediately think of the shocking scene in the movie of tens of thousands of people in the square carnival, just because of a few drops of perfume, it seems ridiculous, but when we replace the perfume with something else? Such as money, power, status, honor? Any of these things can be enough to drive a person crazy. People can do whatever they can to pursue any of these, and they can abandon or ignore the happiness they already have in order to get any of them. The people of the past were like this, and the people of today are the same.
These things are often a huge temptation for people, they make people scrambling, fighting each other to death. Just like at the end of the movie, everyone swarmed towards Grenouille and finally divided him up.
In connection with today, we can think of "money worship" that has become a hot topic in the past few years. In a broad sense, "money worship" is essentially "materialism", which is to put material or interests first, ignoring the real choice in one's heart . "I'd rather cry in a BMW than laugh on a bike" is clearly a wrong value. However, if the pursuit of such material is reckless, without paying attention to the shaping of the mind and spirit, the final result is often death.
Just like the head of the orphanage, the cobbler and the perfumer in Perfume, they are all greedy people who put their own interests first, and they all end up dying in different accidents without exception. And Grenouille, a tragic figure, didn't realize the importance of love and the true meaning of spiritual power until the last moment. This can all show that "fetishism" is not desirable, and those who have been stubbornly holding this value will eventually perish.
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