Other resonating ones include “Bastille” by Isabel Coixet, who, compared to her earlier selfishly cloying feature film, My Life Without Me, writes a more sympathetic story about a man (Sergio Castellito) trying to figure out how to tell his wife (Miranda Richardson) that he is leaving her for his mistress (Leonor Watling), until a gloomy fate strikes. Coixet is certainly able to use her third-person narration far more effectively than Alexander Payne’s disappointing segment, “14th arrondissement” about a Denver housewife (Margo Martindale) narrating to herself how she finds solace and peace in Paris. The differences between the two (and several others that do use first-person narration much more effectively) is remarkable in proving that it is better to present the characters actually showing the feelings apart from the narration rather than merely spelling it out in blunt dialogue and thus feeling like a unnecessary coda at the end.

Incidentally, one of the best segments is “Tour Eiffel,” a love story between two misunderstood mimes (Paul Putner and Yolande Moreau) who obviously don’t speak a line of dialogue. The director of this piece, Sylvain Chomet, knew how to make endearing the bizarre and the eccentric in The Triplets of Belleville and here, he brings the added bonus of silent comedy seen through unassuming idiosyncrasy. If it is often said that comedians or mimes are crying on the inside while smiling on the outside, this sweet story seems to show that sharing such a common trait can be a reason to fall in love, too.

The one that stays with me most, however, is “Place de Fetes” by Oliver Schmitz, which brings the idea of unrequited love to painful extremes while exposing more of the underbellies of Paris. It is interesting that this tale is the most touching despite that it is the one that depends the most on coincidence in bringing its principal characters, played by Seydou Boro and Aissa Maiga, together. But when the story goes on to show that a coincidental meeting may be the happiest kind of relief one can find within despair, it reminds us how much we want to believe that there are no such things as coincidences.

The remaining segments are all solid including Alfonso Cuaron’s unbroken, handheld single-take, “Parc Monceau,” starring Nick Nolte and Ludivine Sagnier as two people whose loving relationship does not reveal its true nature until the very end, and Gus Van Sant’s “Le Marais,” about a French man who reveals to someone that he has found his soul-mate in a language the other does not understand. The most fluidly dialogue-driven one is “Quartier Latin” by Gerard Depardieu and Frederic Aubertin starring Ben Gazzara and Gena Rowlands as an old couple who perhaps waited too long to finalize their divorce because they loved each other too much through their tribulations. Richard LaGrevenese’s “Pigalle” also similarly presents Bob Hoskins and Fanny Ardant as an estranged couple who wonder if their love is too theatrical to be real, albeit this one paradoxically feels more written than acted. There is also one from Olivier Assayas called “Quartier des Enfants Rouges” with Maggie Gyllenhaal as a drug-addicted American actress who looks for a comforting serendipitous encounter akin to the one in the opening segment, “Montmartre” by Bruno Podalydes.