ON a balmy night with a lunar eclipse about to happen, plastic surgeon Rocco (Marco Giallini) and therapist Eva (Kasia Smutniak) are cooking up a storm in their Rome apartment in preparation for the arrival of three other couples for the usual kind of middle-class dinner party, where everybody is familiar with everybody else and any issues that arise won’t be serious. 

Before leaving home, Carlotta (Anna Fogliettaa) whips skirt up and knickers down without husband Lele’s (Valerio Matsandrea) knowledge. New wife Bianca (Alba Rohrwacker) hasn’t yet told small-business venturer husband Cosimo (Edoardo Leo) that she’s trying to start a family.

Peppe (Guiseppe Battiston), a bear of a man, a teacher, is expected to bring Lucilla whom the others haven’t yet met. He’s late and alone.

Someone suggests that they each put his/her mobile phone on the table and share whatever comes in on them during the dinner.

Director Paolo Genovese has a reputation for making comedies about people confronting shared issues. “Perfect Strangers” fits that category well. It’s very funny. In a clever screenplay by Filippo Bologna and Paolo Costella, Peppe unintentionally wrecks the group’s equilibrium. Accusations fly, complaints arise, intimate secrets are uncovered. Then order is restored and everybody goes home.

It’s delicious fun, disturbed but fortunately not spoiled by a technical defect – several subtitles are a few seconds out of sync.

At Palace Electric