English Translation
What a wonderful night!
To be honest, this translation was unexpected. A case of a “false friend”?
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Just the opposite eh!
This is interesting, I wasn’t really aware that a word that is derived from the same Latin root has a different meaning in Italian and and English. I think the most common meaning of “formidabile” nowadays is “exceptional”, “out of the ordinary”, “inducing admiration or awe”, but it may mean “extremely powerful”, and “dreadful” too.
I checked three online dictionaries, and each listed as the first meaning a different definition: dreadful, exceptional or powerful. One of them[3] lists the “dreadful” meaning as obsolete.
Anyway, i noticed that in many languages there are words that literally mean “scary” or something like that, and end up having a positive meaning. In Italian, we have “tremendo” and “mostruoso” (thanks to Paolo Villaggio’s Fantozzi movies).
“formidabile” woudn’t be my first choice of word to translate “wonderful”. I would use “fantastica” or “meravigliosa”. I would use “formidabile” if I wanted to say that something extremely significant happened during said night.
[1] https://dizionari.corriere.it/dizionario_italiano/F/formidabile.shtml
[2] formidàbile in Vocabolario - Treccani
[3] Formidabile > significato - Dizionario italiano De Mauro
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In French “formidable” means fantastic - so I see nothing much odd about this.
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Esatto! Famously French.
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That’s interesting, and now that you say that, I knew it! 
What’s useful to note is that in English, the main meaning of “formidable” is “arousing fear”, which may be difficult to realize when you learn the language on your own – I am sure I have seen the word used a few times, finding the collocation a bit odd, but understanding it as “awe inspiring” or “powerful” -which kind of made sense- when the author meant it as “scary”.
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