Every relationship needs work to thrive—but that makes it easy to forget that you’ll find a shared effortlessness at the heart of the deepest friendships and romances. Four years after Paris Can Wait, Eleanor Coppola returns with a charming triptych of stories exploring love in all of its forms, and coaxes a simmering chemistry from her star-studded ensemble. She and co-writer Karen Leigh Hopkins render each relationship’s obstacles with a light touch and naturalistic ease: one married couple (Joanne Whalley and Chris Messina) finds an unconventional way to transcend long distance through technology, and another (Kathy Baker and Marshall Bell) tries to reignite their honeymoon-phase heat through a spontaneous sailing trip.

But Coppola broadens the scope in her third story, in which a tragic loss brings together a disparate group (including Cybill Shepherd, Rosanna Arquette, and Rita Wilson) for a memorial meal hosted by their mutual friend’s daughter (Maya Kazan). All three pieces coalesce in a poignant and exuberant ode to the myriad ways in which one life can touch another, with an understated affection for the mistakes we sometimes make along the way.—Dan Hunt