May is met with some defensiveness and hesitation particularly from Sherif, but they all fearfully agree and the game begins. As the conversation diverts to how everyone closely grips their phones to them, May proposes a game where everyone places their phones face-up in the middle of the table, and whatever messages are received, they have to be heard and read aloud to all those who are present. The night begins with small talk, particularly revolving around Rabih’s no-show girlfriend. The couple invites Maryam and Sherif (Mona Zaki and Eyad Nassar), who are passively worn out because of their two children, Ziad and Jana (Diamand Abou Abboud and Adel Karam), the passionately and newlywed couple, and lastly Rabih (Fouad Yammine) whose date for the party was a no-show. The movie starts with hosts May and Walid (played by Nadine Labaki and Georges Khabbaz respectively), a loveless couple who navigate through teenage trouble with their daughter.
Smaraya’s star-studded Pan-Arab cast all bring a masterful performance of a friend group that has presumably known each other for years, but as the night unfolds, get to know each other quite a bit more intimately. Inspired by the 2016 Italian film by Paolo Genovese of the same title, Lebanese director Wissam Smayra’s movie revolves around the story of seven close friends who get together for dinner and decide to play a game that involves them placing their phones on the table, and agreeing in to openly share all calls, texts, and voice message as they come. Netflix’s first-ever Arabic original film, Ashab Wala A’azz (‘Perfect Strangers’ in English), intriguingly portrays this distinctly intense modern fear while setting the stage for more representation in the Arab cinema world. Fearful of all things untold, our phones, locked, are clenched into our hands. Very few things are as vulnerable as the things we keep on our phones.
Perfect Strangers: Netflix’s Bold First Arabic Original Film Sets the Stage for More Representation
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