“Lost in Perfection” is a generally straightforward melodrama with thriller elements, or maybe a simple thriller with lots of melodrama (contrived plot twists and character “complications”).

But every so often, one is allowed to ponder if it isn’t some sort of Taiwanese dark comedy, with suicide, political intrigues, the manipulative media being manipulated and a “Black Widow” having one over on one and all.

Our alleged villainess is billed “The Unattractive Femme Fatale.” Kudos to zaftig co-star
Mei-Hsiu Lin for signing on and leaning into that label, that of a dowdy rural masseuse who acquires a small fortune from older Taipei men seduced by her magic fingers and whatnot.

Our heroine (Yu-Wei Shao) is an “eat a cookie” skinny TV anchor used to doing anything for clicks — fluff pieces on the politically-embattled premier’s dog-rescuing hobby, for instance, at the behest of the politician’s handlers. Even Li Mei’s choice for a husband (Figaro Tseng) seems focus-grouped.

She’s all about their wedding — the perfect photos, the media coverage, pleasing her doting dad (Tien-Chu Lee). She obssesses about her weight, her image, her work promotion and her daddy. Too bad if the groom gets pushed aside. But then, he’s into sex and she just isn’t.

And then there’s the opportunistic prosecutor who is sure he’s on the track of a master scammer who turns out to be Hsu Liang Ho, who just happens to be Li Mei’s dad’s neighbor and new paramour, and our “Unattractive Femme Fatale.”

What’s amusing about Prosecutor Lee isn’t his eager pursuit of fame and promotion, or his willingness to play ball to manipulate public opinion for his case, and perhaps away from the scandals about to envelope the government.

Prosecutor Lee is played by Rhyian Vaughan, an actor of Chinese and Welsh heritage who is a dead ringer for Tom Cruise. Every time I see him I expect him to jump out of a plane, on a bike or into an impossible mission and I chuckle. Look at that bottom photo and tell me I’m wrong.

Hsin Yin Sung’s latest — she did “On Happiness Road” — isn’t the most graceful weaving of all these disparate threads into a streamlined movie. Subplots drift into the background only to abruptly return to the foreground. Li Mei’s on-and-off engagement is the biggest one of those to lose in the mix.

But the bigger ideas resonate — a scandal blown-up without direct evidence, a “woman’s wiles” and agency overstated or discounted, the “unattractive” woman underestimated but having something she can teach the “perfect” one, the fragile manhood in this culture (the “victims” commit “suicide by charcoal” — lighting fires in closed spaces) and the media’s complicity in what we learn about and what gets covered up.

And a couple of scenes have a seriously twisted humor about them, not just the ones involving the look-alike for Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes’ ex.

Rating: TV-14, explicit sex, nudity

Cast: Yu-Wei Shao, Mei-Hsiu Lin, Rhydian Vaughan, Figaro Tseng and Tien-Chu Lee

Credits: Scripted and directed by Hsin Yin Sung. A Netflix release.

Running time: 1:54