the green ray (éric rohmer, 1986)

The Green Ray is the fourth Rohmer film I have seen, and I'm afraid I'm still not overly impressed. I like them OK, but that's as far as I want to go. The same ideas come up whenever I write about his films. I can't resist quoting my previous reviews. Thus, writing about both My Night at Maud's and Love in the Afternoon, I cited my comments on Claire's Knee. I guess you could say that Rohmer has a recognizable style. To copy myself again, in The Green Ray, a bunch of intelligent and articulate people talk a lot. Not for the first time in a Rohmer movie, I was reminded of Linklater's Before series. I love those movies, but I've never fallen in love with Rohmer.

Marie Rivière is strong in the lead role of Delphine, and her improvisations were important enough that she gets a co-writing credit with Rohmer. The dialogue is offhanded in a realistic way. I just never found Delphine to be compelling (surprising in that she reminded me at times of myself). She's adrift, intent on searching for something but lacking any insight into herself. "I don't have anything. Things aren't obvious to me. I'm not normal, like you. When I make an effort I try to listen, to talk to people. I listen, I watch what's going on. If people don't come to me it's because I'm worthless and... if I had something to show, people would see it, that's all."

Delphine isn't worthless, and you can see why her friends try to encourage her to blossom. But there isn't much growth. Rohmer doesn't construct a narrative out of her life, which you could argue just adds to the film's realism. But as she goes from Paris to the beach, back to Paris, to the Alps, back to Paris, to Cherbourg, finally to Biarritz, I finally lost interest. #312 on the They Shoot Pictures, Don't They list of the top 1000 films of all time.