Let’s play a game then.
We’ll all put our phones on the table…
Not just a box office hit but also a national phenomenon, Paolo Genovese’s latest dramedy has got the whole of Italy asking: How well do we really know those closest to us?
Fuelled by a fiendishly clever screenplay and an all-star cast, Perfect Strangers gathers a group of good friends around the dining table – three 30-something couples and a bachelor – where one suggests they make all SMSs and phone calls public across the course of the night. The reason: to prove they have nothing to hide.
What seems like an innocent experiment results in some eye-opening disclosures – even a swapping of phones in a desperate concealment attempt – that shows how performance dominates our public lives.
As Genovese says, “Smartphones have become a fundamental object, perhaps the only one that we always carry with us – our ‘black box’.” Never has the time been so ripe to offer such a cinematic take on a classic morality conundrum.
