Perfect Sense

The name David Mackenzie first caught my attention with the modern western Hell or High Water, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Perfect Sense, however, is a completely different kind of film. The closest comparison might be Soderbergh’s Contagion, but Perfect Sense is still quite distinct. It’s not a film with a particularly high budget, but on the other hand, it has a concept that hasn’t been explored before. A film about the gradual loss of human senses, one after the other? That’s something we really haven’t seen before, and it’s a good thing someone came up with it. I liked everything about the film, though I would have toned down the romantic subplot between Ewan McGregor and Eva Green, which felt a bit overdone and somewhat detracted from the overall effect. It’s not that it didn’t fit, but the creators seemed to give it more attention than the actual loss of human senses. I enjoyed how, during the loss of hearing, as a viewer, you really couldn’t hear anything—it struck me as a brilliant idea. The narrator's words stuck in my mind minute by minute. The ending was grand. It's a magnificent film made on a small budget, and it’s one that will make you think for days after watching it. I give it 83%. (06/11/2017)

The topic was good; when I read the blurb about it I was looking forward to watching. Unfortunately, I found the treatment very disappointing; I didn’t like it. The first half of the movie came over all comical and confused. The other half began to take off and was significantly better, but no good enough to make up for the beginning. I’m quite surprised at the high rating (76%); I found this movie absolutely mediocre. (04/21/2015)

Perfect Sense is a more philosophical version of Soderberg’s Contagion, but with more modest production. With the exception of the nicely done ending, however, it is just as cold and detached, which is not the best choice, given the film’s focus on the two central characters (and their relationship). (02/06/2012)

Steven Soderbergh (Contagion) is much better because he takes a stark, pragmatic, factual approach. David Mackenzie wants to grasp the entire thing in a purely emotional and philosophical way, but he doesn't quite succeed, as we learn almost nothing and he just muses idly to the accompaniment of ethereal music, so the whole thing feels strange. Plus points for the atypical film contribution and a naked Eva Green, otherwise nothing great. (06/27/2016)

A perfect premise, no doubt. The director of Spread has made a surprisingly ambitious romantic drama with a global catastrophe as a backdrop. The result is quite impressive, but it could have been even more so if the relationship between the two protagonists worked better – I just didn’t feel any bond between McGregor and Green. The apocalyptic line works much better and it was the most enjoyable thing in Perfect Sense. What’s a stumbling block, though, is that the creators want to express way too many things in these two lines (from personal relationships, through the human nature, all the way to our relationship with our planet) and I couldn’t catch the central motif, if there was any to begin with. The resulting impression is as if someone had optimistically told me that I still have one year of a happy life left… 7/10 (01/15/2012)