Delphine's Summer: More Real Than Reality TV

Alright, film fanatics, moviebuff_marc here, back at it again digging through the cinematic crates. This time I stumbled upon "The Green Ray" (aka "Le Rayon Vert"), and man, it's a trip. I gotta be honest, I went in blind, didn't even know who directed it (apparently nobody wants to take official credit?), just saw the year '86 and figured, hey, why not? So, it's about this French woman, Delphine, who's basically having a full-blown existential crisis during her vacation. She's supposed to go to the mountains with a friend, but it falls through, and she ends up wandering around, kinda mopey, looking for… something. It's like a French version of "Into the Wild," but instead of Christopher McCandless battling nature, it's Delphine battling her own anxieties. There's this one scene where she's trying to connect with people at a resort and it's just painfully awkward. Like that time I tried to salsa dance at a wedding, except way more cringey. What I found interesting is that you find your self rooting for her even though some of her actions are kinda annoying. What's really wild is that apparently huge parts of it were unscripted! They just followed the actress around and filmed her interacting with… well, mostly regular people. It's almost like reality TV before reality TV was a thing, if that makes sense. It reminded me a little of Cassavetes, but way more... low key? It's definitely not an action-packed blockbuster, and honestly, it's probably not for everyone. But if you're into introspective character studies and you don't mind a very slow burn, give "The Green Ray" a shot. You might be surprised. I know I was. Oh, and does anyone know why the director goes uncredited? I tried to google it and got nothing but wikipedia. Maybe it's because it's too real, I don't know.