Perfect Sense

PERFECT SENSE (Cinema)
Arrow Films

Release date: October 7th, 2011
Certificate (UK): 15
Running time: 92 minutes

Director: David MacKenzie
Writers: Kim Fupz Aakeson
Composers: Max Richter

Cast: Ewan McGregor, Eva Green

What makes us feel alive? Is it the things we have or the senses we share? Or is it to share what we sense?

To see, to taste, to hear, to smell and to touch, these are our five modes of perception through which we filter our experiences of and in the world. What if we were to collectively begin losing them, how would it affect our abilities to learn, grow and even survive? Would it be the end of civilisation or the beginning of a new one, and if so, how?

Directed by David MacKenzie, Perfect Sense has been described as a sci-fi drama and it’s a term that only so very loosely classifies what type of film it is. The science aspect of it is little too none, more accurate might have been “social drama” as it deals more with how we interact with one another.

Its story rests precariously on Michael (Ewan McGregor), a chef at a Glasgow restaurant, and Susan (Eva Green), an epidemiologist who catches his eye. As they throw themselves into a physical relationship, reports begin to surface about people around the world losing their senses.

Starting with the sense of smell and moving through to the others, the ripple effects are devastating. Sufferers become frustrated, panicked and grief stricken at the sudden loss of something we all take for granted. Society as a whole begins to disintegrate and scenes of looting, military presence and mass quarantine occupy the latter part of Perfect Sense.

Unsurprisingly, this leads to a greater appreciation of what we perceive to be the human condition. The need to feel, address what we feel and communicate those feelings is what ties Perfect Sense together, but for its ambition it overlooks some vital elements and what it does look at, it does so in a wholly clichéd manner. While much time is spent in bed with the couple and watching them express their frustrations, opportunities to focus on the bigger picture, the science and philosophy, goes missed. For example, the cross sensory perception is neglected and so to is the idea that all sensory stimulus are essentially vibrations.

Given such neglect in the film’s story to address more than a romance against the backdrop of a civilisation crumbling, it’s inevitable to see Perfect Sense as a reflection of a society that loses something it never learned how to use.