Tykwer and Whishaw praise Rickman
The official website for the film Perfume has been updated. There is some more stuff with and about Alan Rickman now, and again I felt compelled to translate it.

[…] As the third antagonist among the group (the others are Grenouille and Baldini) versed British stage and film actor Alan Rickman could be engaged. It wasn’t a difficult decision. "(As with Dustin Hoffman) Alan was the first actor that came to mind for the role of Richis; we didn’t ask anyone else. I wanted to give Richis some ambiguity because both in the novel and in the film he is someone who distinguishes himself from his fellow citizens, who has a sharp intellect and a strong intuition, and who loves his daughter above everything else," Tykwer recapitulates the casting […].

Whishaw, his young colleague, particularly loves the "incredible voice" of Alan Rickman, who plays the smart merchant Richis from Grasse, who in turn is afraid for his daughter Laure. "Rickman is able to play a scene in a very stringent and at the same time ethereal way. His acting is very complex, and with him you always have to be aware of the fact that many other things are going on under the surface."

Rickman himself has never read the novel. For him the book was like an unknown icon, of which he knew that millions of people have read it. While shooting the film, it was more essential to him that the film was the exclusive medium the director concentrated on, which is why it is always very important for a film actor to work with a "really good" director. (Don’t ask me what this sentence means. It doesn’t make sense in German either.) This was the case with Tom Tykwer. "I admire Tom’s work very much. His films are so unique that one could assume – and also if you think of his artistic stringency – that he were a rather humourless director. Indeed, Tom is very determined in his work, but at the same time he’s the most charming, open-minded and generous person I know. Therefore, the atmosphere at the set was utterly delightful," Rickman says in retrospect. The exceptional actor, whom the younger cinema audience mostly knows for his popular portrayal of the obscure Severus Snape in the Harry Potter films, also formed an honest opinion on Bernd Eichinger. "It is very rare to meet a producer who is so passionate, helpful, well-read and eccentric at the same time – he’s a fantastic producer."

Tom Tykwer was convinced of the professional ambiguity of the actor who plays Richis. "We needed a powerful antagonist for Grenouille. The actor not only was supposed to play a father, but also someone who seriously challenges Grenouille. Even if the audience thinks at first that Grenouille seems to become more invincible in the second part of the film, does at the same time Richis develop in a way that makes you think: He could defeat Grenouille."

Rickman describes his film character, the merchant Richis from Grasse, in a few sentences: "Richis exclusively defines himself by his strong love for his daughter. His words ‘You are everything that’s left to me’ are characteristic of someone who has to cope without his beloved, dead wife. This character’s story entirely deals with how to protect his child from an unknown danger, which may lurk everywhere: in the trees, the bushes, the side roads, the dark corners and also right at home." Rickman particularly was interested in the opposite between the glamorous, luxurious and neat upper world, where Richis and his daughter live, and the shadow world that proliferates beneath the precious wigs of the nobility. "Perfume and fragrances influence the entire story and the film – in a pleasant as well as in a terrible way," Rickman explains.

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It's a long time ago that I read the book, but I wonder a bit about the last paragraph. Isn't Richis described as very possessive and materialistic? I seem to remember that he wanted to marry off Laure in about a year so that he himself was free to marry again because he needed a male heir. And his extreme interest in Laure isn't only the doting interest of a father who has no other close relatives.