🔗 Share this article

Inspired by the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. Once the French-speaking employee is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she lingers uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking marine dishes cooked by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model gunning for a move to the capital. But this comfy routine is disrupted when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.

Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in flashes of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his loner ethic and stingy with particulars of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both advocating plastic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in residence.

Performances and Cinematic Craft

The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

The film can be seen on Mubi from 7 November.