Shall We Kiss

If Shall We Kiss? plays almost like a satire of a French film, it's still smarter than your average American romantic comedy and boasts better than average wardrobes and a classical score heavy on Schubert, Tchaikovsky, and Verdi. Émilie (Julie Gayet) and Gabriel (Michaël Cohen) meet cute in the scenic city of Nantes and are instantly attracted to each other, but at the end of their evening together, Émilie resists a kiss because she's involved with someone. Turns out Gabriel is too, but he doesn't see the harm, which leads Émilie to tell him a cautionary tale. The subsequent movie-within-a-movie involves her friend Judith (Virginie Ledoyen), Judith's husband, Claudio (Stefano Accorsi), and Nicolas (director Emmanuel Mouret), Judith's best pal since childhood. When Nicolas breaks up with his girlfriend, he falls into a funk and turns to Judith for consolation. A subsequent kiss is so good that it leads to an affair, which continues even after Nicolas begins dating Câline (Frédérique Bel). The friends-turned-lovers realize they'll have to end their other relationships, so they come up with a plan to soften the blow and to ensure that Claudio and Câline don't wind up alone, but the scheme quickly disintegrates and proves just how powerful one kiss can be—in ways both good and bad. As Émilie puts it, “The body is unpredictable,” but she could just as easily be referring to the heart. Recommended. (K. Fennessy)