The film I was thinking of this morning was, Polyester (1981) (日本語), not Pink Flamingos, however, these two films have the same the director, John Waters, and main actor (-ess?), Divine, and both are of the  cult transgressive genre. The reason that this stuck in my memory for 30 years, is precisely because Polyester features scratch-and-sniff odorama. I remember being intrigued by that prospect but not sufficiently intrigued to take the trouble to see this film, which was usually shown, like other transgressive cult films, starting after midnight. In those days, I was much keener on Neuer Deutscher Film directors like Herzog, Fassbinder, Wim Wenders, and Margarethe von Trotta. I most likely would not have been able to sit through a John Waters film, and the cult transgressive audience of the day would most likely have irritated me. ‘Scratch-and-sniff’ cinema remains an unrealized experience.

I did however spend a couple of years trying to build a mathematical model of the olfactory system and ran a reading/discussion group on the topic of smell when I worked at Caltech. But that is another story.