At the start of summer vacation, Delphine has just suffered the breakup of a relationship and her traveling companion has ditched her so that her new boyfriend can accompany her to Greece instead.

Another friend invites Delphine to join a beach party in Cherbourg for the weekend, but she finds that she is the only one amongst the group who is single so she quickly returns to Paris.

Traveling restlessly, the theme of the movie (characterized by Roger Ebert) becomes clear: Delphine "is incapable of playing the dumb singles games that lead to one-night stands".

As was becoming his custom in pre-production, Rohmer gathered his cast together to discuss the project and their characters and allowed each actor to invent their dialogue.

Rohmer stated that lead actress Marie Rivière "is the one who called the shots, not only by what she said, but by the way she'd speak, the way she'd question people, and also by the questions her character evoked from the others"[This quote needs a citation] The film was shot chronologically and in 16 mm so as to be "as inconspicuous as possible, to have Delphine blend into the crowd as a way, ultimately, of accentuating her isolation".

Rohmer also instructed his cinematographer, Sophie Maintigneux, to keep technical aspects of the shoot to a minimum so as to not interrupt or distract the actors.

[This quote needs a citation] The experiment paid off when the film was a commercial success after being released three days after its initial broadcast.

[citation needed] The Green Ray won the Golden Lion and the FIPRESCI Prize at the 43rd Venice International Film Festival.