MovieChat Forums > Crimen Ferpecto (2004) Discussion > Please explain perfecto/ferfecto

Please explain perfecto/ferfecto

posted 15 years ago by dnjnyc
5 replies | jump to latest

For the record, I love this movie. Character, good storytelling, style, smart black humor, surreal and (at times) psychedelic sensibility, and fine actors who understood it all. And message(s) - (beyond the most obvious beauty/ugliness/respect one). And all this implies great direction. I am on my third viewing and still laughing out loud.

But to my question: Not only the film's title, but a key scene within (when Rafa's complete psychosis gushes out) put a sharp focus on him getting the word right: "perfecto" vs. the (accidental?) mistake "ferfecto." Is this just a comic quirk, or am I missing something in language and wordplay?

Cheers.

[–] fabian8 15 years ago

What I understood is that he needed a Perfect plan to commit the crime. That's why he started buying all that movies to get some ideas, but when he bought "Crimen Perfecto (Perfect Crime)" an error ocurred, showing in the screen "Crimen Ferpecto (Ferpect Crime)". Because of that simple spelling error, that movie wasn't useful: Rafael needed something 100% perfect.

At the end you know why the crime it's Ferpecto and not Perfecto: it ALMOST worked but not entirely. He started a new life and he escaped from Lourdes, the woman he hated, but now she became all he wanted: being rich and famous. But he left her and his old life, so he can't enjoy that life he wanted ever.

[–] dnjnyc 15 years ago

Thanks, Fabian. Makes ferpect sense!

Actually I now see I was mistaken -- I thought the register said, when he bought the DVDs, "Ferfecto." But the P and F inversion, leading to "Ferpecto," is much neater.

Don't mean to sound so picky -- I still think this is one hilarious film. No apologies...my kind of black humor.

[–] Mlg770000 15 years ago

Well, I would say that the fact that there's a mistake in the title of the film he's buying is a bad omen. There's no perfect murder and mistakes are bound to happen. That's why he freaks out.

[–] raifilter 14 years ago

In an interview, director said it was a nod to Astérix & Obélix comic "Les lauriers de César", in which there's a running gag about the characters being drunk and repeating the word (in the spanish translation) "ferpectamente" ("ferpectly"). Thus, "perfecto".

[–] SeisCinemaSeis 14 years ago

The movie is about a snobbish guy who's always looking for "perfection" (Rafael). He despises everything that is not perfect (Women, clothes, cars, people in general terms). Rafael embraced decidedly the banal, vapid and over-materialistic concept that reigns nowadays about what a "perfect man" should posess, and about how this perfect man should look and even behave.
BUT when his triumph appears to be inevitable, something goes wrong and suddenly all his dreams of a "perfect life" are shattered. He kills by accident his new boss and falls under the control of the "ugly" and machiavellian Lourdes who witnessed all. By making a pact with her, Rafael is able to make real his dream about being the general store manager. But it's not the situation he imagined, because now he's used (and abused) in every imaginable way by Lourdes. Therefore his perfect world, becomes semi-fullfilled. Actually it becomes a nightmare for him. So the crime that allowed him to reach his new charge, instead of being a "perfect crime" becomes a "ferpect crime" (imperfect).
The title is also a homage to Hitchcok "Dial M for Murder" that in Spain is known as "Crimen Perfecto".
BTW Why on earth the original title was changed on this site? The movie was named "Crimen ferpecto" (Ferpect Crime) for a reason. I don't get why the title was changed to "El crimen perfecto" (The Perfect Crime), that's an "imperfection" that should be fixed by IMDB admins.