In the 18th century, a man called Jean is in a cell waiting for his sentence. A bunch of
guards come to drag him out and present him to a furious crowd, who yell and ask for justice as a
lord reads the sentence. In two days, Jean will be bound to a cross and beaten up with an iron
rod to then be hung to death. This started a few years ago in Paris. In a horribly smelling market,
a woman attending to her stall starts having contractions and has the baby right there, letting
him drop to the ground. Since all her previous babies were stillbirths, she assumes this one is
dead too so she cuts the cord and pushes him into the leftover fish guts before going back to work.
This baby is Jean and soon takes his first breath, which gets him to smell all the horrid scents from
the market. When Jean cries for the first time, all the people in the market hear him and accuse
the mother of trying to kill him. The mother tries to run away, but the crowd catches her and
she’s executed. Afterward Jean is sent to Madame Gaillard’s orphanage, where there already are so
many kids that they sleep in piles. When the baby is left in one of these many piles, the children
are annoyed by his presence. A boy tries to poke him but Jean grabs the finger and smells it,
which creeps everyone out. The children decide to kill Jean with a pillow and when he starts crying,
Madame Gaillard comes over to save him and whips the children for their misbehavior. Years pass and
by age five, Jean still can’t talk. The other kids think he’s a weirdo and avoid him, so Jean spends
his time using his unique talent. It turns out he has a superior olfactory sense that allows him to
identify any scent, even if it’s far away or it’s something that isn’t supposed to smell. At this
age Jean still can’t differentiate good from bad smells, he just likes exploring and discovering
new scents. Sometimes he even smells dead animals, and the other kids would throw rotten fruit at him
for being creepy. Eventually Jean learns to talk and to tell what objects are around him with his
eyes closed by just using his nose. By the time he turns thirteen, Madame Gaillard sells Jean to
Grimal, the owner of a tannery. Jean becomes an apprentice and Gaillard gets some money,
but on her way home, she gets robbed and killed. Life expectancy in the tannery is five years, but
Jean proves he’s tough and works hard every day, dreaming of visiting the city someday to explore
more scents. After several years pass of Jean working over ten hours a day, Grimal finally takes
Jean with him to the city to make a delivery. As Jean walks through the crowded streets,
he lets his nose absorb all the new scents no matter if they’re good or bad. When Grimal
gets busy making the delivery, Jean lets his nose guide him to a particularly wonderful scent that
comes from a shop. It’s a perfume called “Amor and Psyche” and as Jean watches the creator,
he learns that scents can be mixed to make new ones. Suddenly, Jean catches the sweetest scent
he’s ever smelled and instantly becomes fascinated with it. He runs after it and discovers it comes
from a red-haired woman selling plums. He begins following her around town and when he gets close
enough, he sniffs her shoulder. The woman is startled and tries to communicate with him,
but Jean doesn’t answer. She tries offering him some plums and Jean responds by burying his nose
in her hand, causing her to get scared and run away. Refusing to give up, Jean tracks her scent
and after dodging the people throwing fireworks, she finds the woman sitting at a table. He sneaks
behind her to smell her for a while until she turns around and sees him. The woman is about to
scream, but Jean covers her mouth just in time and drags her into the shadows when he hears a noise.
A couple walks by and Jean waits for them to be gone to let go of the woman, only to discover
he’s accidentally suffocated her to death. He isn’t upset for long though, soon he’s taking the
woman’s clothes so he can smell her from head to toe. However as minutes pass, the body loses its
living scent and Jean despairs. That night, Grimal beats him up for running off. Then Jean can’t
sleep because he keeps thinking about the woman’s scent and decides his goal in life is a way to
preserve someone’s scent to never lose it again. Meanwhile Giuseppe laments his lack of clients. He
used to be the best perfumer in the country, but since his rival made “Amor and Psyche”, clients
won’t come to him anymore. Desperate to revive his business, Giuseppe tries to figure out the formula
of “Amor and Psyche” but no matter how much he smells it, he can’t get it right. One night,
Jean brings a delivery for Giuseppe, who allows him to enter his lab to drop the order. Jean is
amazed by all the ingredients and smells, and he can tell that Giuseppe has been experimenting with
“Amor and Psyche”. He tells him what ingredients he’s missing, claiming to be the best nose in
Paris. Giuseppe is skeptical and tells Jean to prove himself. Without hesitation, Jean begins
mixing all the ingredients, ignoring Giuseppe when he scolds him for not using the right techniques.
When Jean’s done, Giuseppe is shocked to discover he’s perfectly recreated “Amor and Psyche”, but
Jean says it’s not a good perfume yet. He quickly starts mixing again, but Giuseppe is angry that
someone inexperienced has bested him so he kicks Jean out. Afterward Giuseppe smells the second
perfume Jean made and the wonderful smell makes him feel in heaven. The next day, Giuseppe buys
Jean from Grimal, who happily accepts the money and gets drunk with it. When he leaves the tavern,
he tries to dodge an incoming carriage and falls, hitting his head and falling into the
river where he dies. Meanwhile Jean starts working as Giuseppe’s apprentice, learning all about the
trade and creating a variety of wonderful perfumes that pushes Giuseppe’s shop back into being the
best in town. Giuseppe teaches Jean that perfume is made of twelve notes and that a legend speaks
of the perfect thirteenth essence that could be added to dominate the others, but it’s never
been found. These words make Jean think about the woman he killed and that night he dreams of her.
Remembering his life goal, Jean asks Giuseppe to teach him how to preserve any scent. The next day,
Giuseppe teaches Jean how to extract the essence of ten thousand roses by boiling them at the right
temperature until the oil condenses and drops into a tiny flask. It takes a lot of waiting,
but eventually the machine releases the rose oil, and Jean is so impressed that he starts
experimenting on his own. He grabs random things from the street like chains and a horseshoe,
and puts them inside the device, hoping to get their scents. In the morning, Giuseppe wakes up
when he hears loud noises coming from his lab. He rushes there to discover Jean having a breakdown
and the boy accuses him of lying because his system can’t extract the smell of anything,
just a few things. Giuseppe can’t believe that Jean has been trying to get the scent of metals,
which aren’t supposed to smell. When Giuseppe checks inside the machine, he’s horrified to
discover Jean has put his cat in it, trying to get its scent as well. Giuseppe yells at Jean,
telling him he can’t distill the scent of a living being, and suddenly Jean passes out. After such
a revelation, Jean quickly falls ill. Giuseppe is devastated and pays for good doctors to take care
of Jean, but they can’t even tell what he has. On his deathbed, Jean asks if there’s any other
method to extract a scent, so Giuseppe tells him about enfleurage, a technique only used in the
city of Grasse. This information immediately helps Jean and in just a few days, he’s healthy again.
Now Jean wants to travel to Grasse but he’ll need the proper paperwork, so Giuseppe grants it
to him in exchange for one hundred new perfume formulas. After Jean leaves, Giuseppe goes to
bed feeling very happy, but suddenly his house crumbles and kills him. On his way to Grasse,
Jean finally gets to explore the countryside and his mood greatly improves thanks to the pure air.
Instead of taking the short roads through various towns, Jean decides to walk through the mountains
to keep breathing clearly. He ends up climbing to the top of a mountain and hiding inside a cave,
where for the first time he can only smell one thing: the scent of dead stone. The lack
of thousands of smells overwhelming him makes him relax so much that he ends up staying there for
several years, and he would’ve stayed longer if it wasn’t for the dreams of the plum woman. When
Jean finally comes out again, he washes his body in the rain and realizes that he doesn’t have a
scent like everybody else, making him feel like a nobody. That moment he swears he would prove to
the world that he’s exceptional. Afterward Jean finally keeps traveling and when he’s about to
reach Grasse, he catches an amazing scent, even better than the plum woman's. A carriage suddenly
passes by and he discovers the scent belongs to the beautiful Laura. Excited, Jean runs all
the way to Grasse and follows his nose until he makes it to a fancy mansion, so he sneaks
inside the garden and watches Laura from afar. He gets as close as he can to smell her scent,
but his time is cut short when her father Richis sends her back inside. The next day, Jean starts
working in a perfume shop where he learns the art of enfleurage under the supervision of Druot. The
process consists of pressing flowers into animal fat and boiling them in a large container to
extract their essence. One night, a couple is fooling around in the barn, but the boy leaves
when the girl teases him too much and she ends up stuck. Soon Jean shows up pretending to help her,
but he actually kills her. Moments later, the girl ends up covered in fat and inside the
container as Jean hopes to get her scent. In the morning, a woman comes by with a flower delivery,
so Jean has to cover the container before the body is discovered. Druot almost catches him too,
but Jean pretends he covered the container to protect the flowers from the sun. In the end,
this process doesn’t extract the girl’s scent, so Jean has to think of something else. In the
evening, he hires a street worker, who brings her dog along. However instead of doing the dirty,
he begins covering her in animal fat. When he takes out a blade to scrape off the fat, the
woman freaks out and cancels their transaction. Jean won’t give up so he quickly kills her and
carries on his new technique. After cutting off her hair, he wraps her entire body in animal fat
and a piece of cloth. A few hours later, Jean scrapes off the fat and puts it through a whole
complicated process that finally extracts the scent of a human being. The next morning while
the locals find the abandoned body, Jean tests the scent by putting just a drop on his hand.
The woman’s dog immediately runs to him, thinking it has smelled its owner. Pleased with himself,
Jean puts this scent in the first bottle out of thirteen, planning to find all the right notes for
the perfect perfume. Sometime later, Jean sneaks into Laura’s birthday party to spy on her. She and
her friends decide to play hide-and-seek in the garden maze, and when Laura is alone, she can see
Jean’s shadow nearby. When he tries to catch her, she thinks it’s part of the game and runs away,
only to be caught by a friend instead. Jealous, Jean throws a rock to destroy the lamp above them,
which sends Laura running again. Soon Richis ends the game but the party’s mood changes when they
discover two girls are missing. Meanwhile Jean is putting those two girls through the fat-and-wrap
process to extract their scents, which he adds to his collection. When Druot comes over to yell at
Jean for ignoring his work, he smells the amazing scent on Jean’s hand and immediately becomes very
docile. The next day, the bodies of the two girls are found in the river. The council calls for a
meeting and Richis asks for curfew until the killer is caught, pointing out that all their
daughters are in danger because except for the street worker, all the other dead girls were pure.
However the council refuses because a curfew could push the town into bankruptcy. For the next few
days, Jean continues to kidnap and kill untouched women to extract their scents, leaving the bodies
in random spots when he’s done. Soon the council accepts to put up a curfew and sends guards to
patrol the streets, but this doesn’t stop Jean and he just keeps on killing. The townspeople are
taken over by fear and paranoia, so they start boarding up their houses and turning against
anyone suspicious to the point of shooting. When Jean kills a nun, who is also his twelfth victim,
the bishop holds a mass to call the killer a demon that shall be excommunicated. The ceremony
is interrupted by a man suddenly bursting in to announce the killer has been captured.
Richis isn’t convinced because the confession was obtained under torture and the details don’t match
the actual killings, but the council just wants to close this case and the man is executed. Meanwhile
Jean mixes the twelve essences and is very pleased with the result, but he knows he’s missing the
final thirteenth note. He wants that final touch to be Laura, who is currently celebrating with
the rest of the locals until Richis shows up to take her home. That night, Jean sneaks inside the
mansion and approaches Laura while she sleeps. Suddenly Richis wakes up and rushes to Laura’s
bedroom, but she’s fine and alone. However Richis notices the window is open. The next morning,
Richis packs their things and goes away with Laura to keep her safe. Hoping to trick the killer,
he sends out an empty carriage in the opposite direction while he and Laura travel by horse.
However Jean’s nose immediately detects that Laura’s scent is getting weaker, so he also packs
his things and begins following her smell to find it. Back in town, the street worker’s dog is also
smelling things out and finds its owner’s clothes buried in the dirt. This is noticed by Druot,
who keeps on digging and soon finds all the dead women’s clothes and hair. Sometime later,
Richis and Laura arrive at a remote inn and rent all the rooms. Richis chooses a room with no
windows for Laura and locks her up for the night. Still tracking her scent, Jean finds the inn,
sneaks through the servants’ room, and steals the key from Richis’ night table to finally reach
Laura. When he’s about to kill her, Laura opens her eyes and looks at him, making him hesitate.
The next morning, Richis checks on his daughter and is horrified to discover she’s dead. Meanwhile
Jean finishes extracting Laura’s essence and adds it to the other twelve to finally create the
ultimate perfume. Before he can sniff it properly, he’s surrounded by soldiers and gets arrested,
but he gets to hide the perfume in his pocket. Afterward, Richis waterboards Jean to make him
confess why he killed Laura, but Jean only answers “I needed her”. Back to the beginning, the day of
Jean’s execution comes and the whole town gathers to watch. When a council lord and a bunch of
guards show up to take Jean, he opens the perfume bottle with a plan in mind. Moments later, a
carriage arrives at the town square and Jean comes out wearing the lord’s clothes plus a few drops
of his perfect perfume. As soon as the people near him smell him, they fall to their knees, amazed by
his mere presence. Jean walks to the scaffold and his scent is so intoxicating that the executioner
immediately declares him innocent. Next Jean puts some perfume on a handkerchief and starts waving
it around to let the scent spread. The whole crow falls into a state of absolute euphoria and even
the bishop gets on his knees, announcing that Jean is actually an angel. The crowd begins yelling and
crying for Jean, who finally feels noticed and powerful. The only one who hasn’t fallen for it
is Richis, who is on a balcony that the perfume hasn’t reached. Then Jean lets his handkerchief
fly with the wind and when it falls in the crowd, it causes everyone to heat up and start doing the
dirty in a huge naughty group. As he watches in shock, Jean imagines himself with the plum woman
and realizes he hasn’t known real love and never will, which makes him cry. Suddenly Richis gets
on the scaffold, ready to finish the execution, but he’s overtaken by the power of the perfume
too and falls to his knees, calling Jean his son. A few hours later, the townspeople wake up and are
overwhelmed with shame. Jean is nowhere to be seen and Druot is arrested instead, since the clothes
and hair were found in his shop. After fourteen hours of torture, Druot confesses and is executed.
Meanwhile Jean returns to his smelly hometown. Since it’s an existence without love is pointless,
Jean stops in the middle of the street and empties the whole perfume bottle on his head. The scent is
so powerful that it causes the locals to rush to him, piling up on top of his body to devour
him. The next morning, the only thing left of Jean’s are his clothes and a drop of perfume.