Morality: Murder?
Obviously, murdering is immoral.
If we talk about how Grenouille's murders are immoral, this would be a rather dull discussion of this brilliant film.
So rather than discussing what is moral in this story, we’ll find a way to make Grenouille innocent for his murders.
If we talk about how Grenouille's murders are immoral, this would be a rather dull discussion of this brilliant film.
So rather than discussing what is moral in this story, we’ll find a way to make Grenouille innocent for his murders.
Brought into this world on a pile of rotting fish guts and pushed aside to die, Grenouille was unwanted from the start. His lack of a human odor gives others a strange reaction whether it is intentional or not. The murderer we come to know through this film is not psychotic, though he is intelligent, but also socially crippled. Grenouille is more comparable to an insect. Any person or any disease cannot kill him; he will be the one to decide when it is his time to go. Grenouille did not have a normal upbringing; other children did not take to him, did not like him, and did not go near him. Grenouille grew up not knowing what it felt like to be loved. Love is something that humans cannot live without and Grenouille comes to a realization that life is worthless when you can never be loved.
Motive
In Multiple Homicide: Patterns of Serial and Mass Murder, Fox and Levin stated that, “Nevertheless, our focus on motivation rather than timing eliminates the need for the "spree killer" designation-a category sometimes used to identify cases of multiple homicide that do not fit neatly into either the serial or mass murder types.” (408). Grenouille did not go out and just kill anyone, he had a specific need and from this he chose wisely before he murdered his perfuming victims. His absence of odor helped him, for the girls never smelled him coming.
Chemical Message
Grenouille was born with an unimaginable sense of smell; his nose has the power to distinguish between the pheromone of one human to another. “Many insects release chemical messages in the form of pheromones, alarm substances and repellent odours in response to particular stimuli.” (Burrows, 10). With emotions, these pheromones change, without knowing, we are able to manipulate a reaction from people by just being comfortable or frightened. Grenouille learned this through time, as he became aware that a natural calm scent has no comparison to the rotten stench of fear.
Become Anything
Depending on our own experiences, certain smells can provoke a sense of comfort, anger, happiness, sadness, and so on. Grenouille studied people and their reactions to specific smells. He then would create human like scents that would give him reactions from others. Grenouille did not have to change his clothes to be different, he only had to change his scent. He was able to become whoever he wanted, with a simple perfume formula. If he wanted, he could become any animal, he could become a new born puppy that people would want to have around as friendly company. He could change his sex by using the scent of women. He would then receive different reactions from men, and be treated with a more tender hand. Grenouille was more brilliant than one may think. He is a mastermind of scents. As he experimented more with different formulas he would test them on animals, similar to scientists testing on lab rats. The way Grenouille would experiment on these animals was simply by covering them with fat to absorb their scent. These experiments did not always turn out how he planned, though the closer he got, the more he realized that he would have to murder his victims before they became frightened so their scents would remain pure.
Genetic Advantage
Grenouille is clearly not comparable to any other human; he is rather more comparable to bacteria or an insect. He does not live through the emotions that a normal person would feel throughout a lifetime; he puts his lack of emotions into work. ““Pheromone trails play an essential role in the exploitation of food resources in populous and eusocially organized insect species (Hӧlldobler & Wilson 1990; Pasteeis & Bordereau 1998; Wyatt 2003).”’ (Schorkopf, Jarau, et. al. 895). If there were more like Grenouille, the people would have behaved more like insects, they would have been able to find food, shelter, and each other better than merely looking with sight. The ability to smell each other like insects would have made colonizing easier. If someone went missing, such as these girls, their scent would have given people a better lead on where to find them. This is similar with how bloodhounds are used to track people from a scented trail. The ability to smell from miles away would give humans the upper hand on finding food, more food means a larger civilization. The only weak individuals would be those who did not possess this sense of smell.
Forever an Outcast
Even through Grenouille’s murderous state to preserve human scent, it still did not prove to be enough for him. The powers of the perfume were so overwhelming that he could have enslaved the love of humanity to do as he pleased. However, in realization that the love was not for him but of the perfume, he did not care for it any longer. Grenouille could never be loved and therefore he decided to travel back to his birthplace and die. He lacked the basic human emotions and had no reason to stay alive. In The Social Sources of Homicide in Different Types of Societies, by Rosenfeld and Messaner stated that, “A number of studies report interaction effects as well as main effects of social inequality on homicide rates, suggesting that the impact of inequality may be contingent on other characteristics of the larger sociocultural setting.” (54). In effects to Grenouille’s cultural position, he was the outcast, he was the one that everyone feared without knowing why and from this, from not being able to participate in a normal society lifestyle, he was only motivated by scents. Had he not had the world of smells to lean on from his lack of socialization, perhaps his murders would have been more drastic. One could argue that maybe he would not have been motivated to murder in the first place because he did not have the same reasons for these murders. However, his tolerance with everything grew because he knew the result of his perfume would be magnificent.