General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

El Crimen Perfecto

El Crimen Perfecto (released in Spain as Crimen ferpecto, internationally as Ferpect Crime) is a 2004 Spanish-Italian black comedy directed by Álex de la Iglesia, about an ambitious department-store salesman who accidentally kills his rival and is blackmailed by the only witness into marriage. It opened in Spain on 22 October 2004 and earned €4,250,837.14 at the Spanish box office on 860,710 admissions.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Original title	Crimen ferpecto, a deliberate misspelling of crimen perfecto; international title Ferpect Crime²^•³
Release	Spain, 22 October 2004; rated not recommended for audiences under 18¹
Director and writers	Álex de la Iglesia; screenplay by de la Iglesia and Jorge Guerricaechevarría³
Lead cast	Guillermo Toledo (Rafael), Mónica Cervera (Lourdes), Luis Varela (Don Antonio), Enrique Villén (Inspector Campoy)⁴
Spanish box office	€4,250,837.14 from 860,710 admissions¹
Goya nominations	Six, including best actor, supporting actor, and new actress; the film won none²
Production	Sogecine (45%), Panico Films (45%), Planet Pictures (10%); shot 17 November 2003 to 11 February 2004⁵

Spoilers

Plot

Rafael (Guillermo Toledo) is a seductive, arrogant salesman who has turned the women's section of a Madrid department store into his personal domain and wants to be promoted to floor manager. His rival is the veteran Don Antonio (Luis Varela) of the men's section. A heated argument between the two ends with Don Antonio dead, and the only witness is Lourdes (Mónica Cervera), a homely, obsessive shop assistant.¹^•²

Lourdes blackmails Rafael with her silence, making him her lover, her slave, and finally her husband. Rafael watches his sophisticated world degenerate into vulgarity, cannot bear the situation, and plans his own "perfect crime" against her.¹^•² In the ending, five years later, Rafael appears with a changed appearance and identity and explains that everyone believes he is dead, so he has committed the perfect crime after all.⁹ The Independent Cinema Office described the film as "a politically incorrect, darkly comic crime caper that mixes high fashion with gleefully gory criminal acts," in which Rafael's only escape from prison lies with Lourdes and a descent into mediocrity.¹⁰

Title

The misspelling is intentional. Álex de la Iglesia knew that the press would be tempted to correct the supposed error and went ahead anyway; the title is a homage to Alfred Hitchcock's Dial M for Murder (1954) with Grace Kelly, the film released in Spain as Crimen perfecto.² On screen the main title alternates between Crimen Perfecto and Crimen Ferpecto, signaling a comedy of errors; the DVD reviewer Glenn Erickson argued the English release title "The Perfect Crime" was too generic for the film.⁶ The title also causes confusion in catalogs: several unrelated films carry the Spanish title El crimen perfecto, including Hitchcock's Dial M for Murder, Andrew Davis's 1998 remake A Perfect Murder with Michael Douglas and Gwyneth Paltrow, and the 2007 American thriller Slow Burn with Ray Liotta.⁷^•⁸

Production

The shoot lasted ten weeks, from 17 November 2003 to 11 February 2004, taking place in Madrid, Sevilla, and Barcelona. Although all the action is set in the Spanish capital, much of the film was shot in Sevilla; the department store set proved difficult to secure.² The production was a Spanish-Italian co-production financed by Sogecine and Panico Films at 45 percent each and Planet Pictures at 10 percent, with the participation of TVE, Canal+ España, and EITB.⁵ SensaCine lists a budget of €3,750,000, shot on 35 mm in 2.35:1 with Dolby Digital sound, distributed in Spain by Warner Bros Pictures España.¹¹ The crew included composer Roque Baños, cinematographer José L. Moreno, and editor Alejandro Lázaro.³^•⁴

Reception

The film performed well at the Spanish box office and, according to RTVE, beyond Spain as well; the outlet attributed its success to a well-established director, a distinctive cast, an engaging story, and a striking title.² It received six Goya nominations, including best actor for Guillermo Toledo, best supporting actor for Luis Varela, and best new actress for Mónica Cervera, but left the ceremony without any awards.²

In the United States the film screened at festivals in 2004 under its original title, El crimen ferpecto, and opened commercially in New York in September 2005 under the Spanish title El crimen perfecto, the same title under which it played at Houston's River Oaks Theatre from 23 September.¹² Critics were broadly favorable: SensaCine's editorial review called it "a nearly perfect black comedy" with a screenplay that borders on the exemplary, and marked it as a turning point in de la Iglesia's career.¹¹ The Chlotrudis Society for Independent Film credited the "brilliant comedic performances of the two leads" for the farce's success.¹³ An academic study of black comedy in de la Iglesia's work reads the film's suspense as resting on a single question, whether Lourdes will denounce Rafael or not.⁹

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026