🔗 Share this article Winter in Sokcho Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burning Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a Korean Frontier Town Based on the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still in utero, trapped between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she lingers uneasily between strained companionship and complex desire. Everyday Existence and Disruption If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model aiming for a move to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the foreigner settles in for a extended visit. Initially matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely. Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan remains a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s mother and partner both advocating plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse. Performances and Directorial Approach The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale. The film can be seen on the streaming service from November 7.