In the 18th century, Jean-Maputiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw) was born in the dirtiest and smelliest place in Paris - the fish market. Grenouille was born with an amazing talent for smell: no matter it was smelly or fragrant, he remembered them one by one and could easily distinguish various smells. When he was 13 years old in an orphanage, he was sold to a leatherworker by the dean. Grenouille lived a life worse than that of a dog or a horse in a leatherwork shop. By chance, Grenouille showed his extraordinary talent in front of the perfumer Baldini and entered the perfume shop to work. But Grenouille was not only satisfied with making the most fragrant perfume in the world, he dreamed of learning how to preserve the smell of everything. Baldini told Grenouille that the origin of perfume was in Grasse, where people knew how to preserve smells. Grenouille came to Grasse with Baldini's letter of recommendation. Grenouille fell in love with the body fragrance of young girls. In order to preserve this fragrance, Grenouille finally embarked on the path of a killer.