A movie centered on domestic abuse isn’t an obvious crowd-pleaser, even when directed by and starring one of Italy’s most popular performers.

Yet exactly such a film, “C’è ancora domani” (“There’s Still Tomorrow”), the directorial debut from the comedian Paola Cortellesi, immediately shot to No. 1 at the national box office after opening in theaters in late October, and this week became one of the country’s 10 highest-grossing films ever.

“Certainly, I’m surprised,” Cortellesi said during an interview in a bar in her leafy Rome neighborhood, though she added, “It’s a good film, and I am satisfied with what I did.” She attributed the movie’s widespread popularity to “having touched a raw nerve in the country.”

The film — which manages to be both heart-wrenching and uplifting — arrived at a time when domestic violence, femicide and women’s rights have dominated public discourse since the death last month of a 22-year-old student, Giulia Cecchettin, in a case in which her former boyfriend is being investigated over her murder.

“There’s Still Tomorrow” is set in 1946, in a Rome still struggling with poverty and the fallout from World War II. Cortellesi, 50, who co-wrote the screenplay, said she had been mulling over the film’s themes — disparity, domestic violence and women’s rights — “for a long time.”

“I wanted to make a contemporary movie set in the past, because I think that unfortunately many things have remained the same,” Cortellesi said. “Naturally there have been advances, rights have changed, laws have changed, but not completely — that is, proportionately, not in the mentality.”