A detached young woman studies nature documentaries to learn how humans are supposed to move, mate, and grieve. She practices kissing on her best friend. She imitates birdcalls with her dying father. None of this makes people make more sense.

ATTENBERG (2010) follows Marina, 23, in a factory town on the Greek coast, where her architect father is preparing, almost ceremonially, for death. He calls the 20th century overrated. She calls most human behavior repellent, and keeps her distance from it, until a stranger arrives and challenges her to a game of foosball.

Director Athina Rachel Tsangari constructed the film around Ariane Labed, whose performance is angular and alien, all stiff limbs and blank stares that occasionally crack into something tender.

The title is a mangled homage to David Attenborough, whose nature programs Marina watches obsessively, searching them for instructions on how to be a person among people.