-By Doris Toumarkine

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Lean and assured like its attractive protagonists, Shall We Kiss? takes a droll and engaging look at what fuels—and tames—the mojo and longings of its young French protagonists. Wry humor, good taste, style everywhere, and quirky honesty make writer/director/actor Emmanuel Mouret’s breezy but knowing gem catnip for both the young and restful, the older and wistful.

Also signaling at least an auspicious start for the film is the fact that distributor Music Box Films was previously “kissed” by last summer’s surprising art-house hit Tell No One.

Not as genre-skewed but just as entertaining, Shall We Kiss? is the interconnected tale of several couples and singletons whose lives amorously and dramatically converge—by happenstance and design. Emerging first in this bright ensemble of the love-struck or the just plain struck are Gabriel (Michael Cohen), a decorative painter living in the Breton city of Nantes, and Emilie (Julie Gayet), a Parisian fabric designer on a brief business trip to the city. The pair, both in relationships, meet one evening when Emilie asks for directions. There’s instant chemistry, but when Gabriel asks for just an innocent kiss, Emilie warns of the danger and, over drinks at her hotel, shares with Gabriel the anecdote that inspired her caution.

Thus emerge Judith (Virginie Ledoyen), a married Parisian lab researcher, and math teacher Nicolas (filmmaker Mouret), her dearest and most trusted friend since high school. Nicolas has a debilitating problem that he can only share with confidante Judith: He is in desperate need of affection, just a kiss in fact. After surfing the Internet for a prostitute, he finds Eglantine (Marie Madinier), a seemingly appropriate hooker who is not only attractive but also a math student. Nicolas jumps in his own discreet manner, but is denied that all-needed kiss as kisses are not in the hooker playbook.

With difficulty, Nicolas coaxes a kiss out of Judith—sympathetic as friends should be—and all heaven and hell ensue. After several secret encounters taking their kisses to erotic limits both sweet and savage, vertical and horizontal, the two are beginning to suspect they have found true love. Bad luck for Judith’s rich and decent, Schubert-obsessed husband Claudio (Stefano Accorsi), who runs a pharmacy and plays tennis at his club.

But in this zigzagging “La Ronde,” Nicolas, reacting to the dangerous situation with the married Judith, has taken up and moved in with Caline (Frédérique Bel), who works for an airline. After Claudio learns of his wife’s infidelity, the impassioned Judith and Nicolas devise a plot that will bring the unsuspecting Claudio and Caline together. The surprising upshot of such deceit redirects the story back to Nantes, where Gabriel and Emilie end their evening, having shared their own revealing stories. But the chemistry between them has not diminished. Shall they kiss? Shall we tell?