4 out of 5 *****

If you have any interest in going to see this film, then you probably shouldn’t read this review. At least not yet. Wait until you’ve seen it first, as there’s no way I can avoid dissecting the movie in detail on here. Perfect Sense is not a simple or superficial story, and it’d be inappropriate of me to discuss it in those terms.

The movie is penned by Danish scribe, Kim Fupz Aakeson, and it shows. It’s the kind of story that you’d more commonly expect from the Scandinavian or Mediterranean stable of art-house cinema. To call it high-concept is probably an understatement. The plot is has strong elements of science fiction, but is more redolent of Andrei Tarkovsy than H.G Wells or Isaac Asimov.

The story – set in present day Glasgow – focuses on the romance between Michael (Ewan McGregor) and Susan (Eva Green). Michael is a  head chef, and we first meet him after he has a one-night stand. As he wakes, he unceremoniously asks his companion for the night to leave – he says that he can’t sleep when someone else is present in bed with him.

Susan is an epidemiologist, who is nursing a broken heart. Her stoic, cool demeanour is an unsurprising counterpoint to Michael, whose workplace is next to Susan’s flat. It leads to one of the more inventive “meet-cutes” I’ve seen for a while, particularly in an era when smoking is increasingly depicted as solecistic in society.

The laboratory where Susan works leads us into the plot; a worldwide pandemic is affecting the planet’s denizens that is causing everyone to lose their senses (literally). One by one, people lose the ability to smell, taste, hear, see and touch. Susan is one of many scientists who work to figure out the cause of this epidemic. But the film is not about how this has happened, but rather how people respond to such an occurrence.

Each time a sense is lost, there is a harbinger that precedes it. First, people are overcome with grief. Then crippling terror. Unadulterated rage comes next. Before finally, the human race feels an uplifting shot of bliss. Director David Mackenzie does a good job of making these sequences work as – like the whole film – they could have descended into farcical territory. It’s not easy depicting people behaving with emotional abandon. The fact that there were a few nervous chuckles in the screening that I was at proved this. As people, we condition ourselves to be restrained, and always in control.

In this story, agency is now a thing of the past. Humanity is helpless to stop the inexorable loss of our senses. One of the major questions posed is how do people behave when we are robbed of the things we take as read? Panic spreads, and governments make cack-handed attempts to keep order. There are numerous occasions when rioting breaks out, cars are upturned, and debris litters the streets. It will trigger potent memories for anyone who was affected by the recent looting that broke out in Britain.

However, in the midst of such uncertainty, another of the movie’s multifarious themes is that life goes on. Our species is nothing if not resilient and adaptable, and people find new ways to cope with the loss of our senses. Street performers put on shows communicating smell using sounds and verbal description. When taste is no more, people become emancipated to consume anything, as all that matters now is texture and consistency, rather than flavour. In lieu of going deaf, nightclubs are crammed with speakers for people to lean against, still able to feel the vibrations of the songs that are playing. As every sense becomes extinct, this new-world paradigm brings Michael and Susan closer together. What may have been nothing more than flirtation rapidly develops into a full-blown love story. As Tyler Durden said in Fight Club, “It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything”. People care less and less about ego and pride. They are reduced to their most basest of characteristics. And while some are eroded by this, others are elevated.

This is a story that sounds great in principle, but should fall apart as it progresses. There are so many ideas at work here, so many motifs in play, that preventing a tale like this from unravelling is a triumph for both Mackenzie and Aakeson. So much so, that I’ve been rendered unable to convey what I feel about this film. I may have been able to process the events of the story, but at the time of writing, I’m still working on processing the feelings it evokes, and as a result, I apologise for this post being a ham-fisted ramble. It’s probably my own fault for writing this so soon after returning from the cinema, but I daren’t have left it until tomorrow.

What Mackenzie has achieved here reminds me in some ways of Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York. Both stories are sweeping in their ambition, exploring the depth of the human experience.

And Perfect Sense’s reach doesn’t exceed its grasp. Thanks to great work from all involved, it is moving, profound, affecting and thought-provoking. I expect like me, you’ll anticipate the denouement before it happens, but that shouldn’t serve to make it any less poignant. Personally my left leg was shaking, while a few rows in front of me, there was a woman who almost stood up, as she struggled to contain her ardour.

In the final monologue of The Office, David Brent ponders how best to make a difference in the world – “I realised that I do. We all do. It’s how we interact with our fellow man.” This could have been the mantra for Perfect Sense.

Yes, life is hard, painful, and often a thankless struggle. But it’s so much preferable to the alternative. And while some may find it pretentious and/or schmaltzy, David Mackenzie has made a film that contains such a beautiful and powerful sentiment, it could just be the film of 2011.