🔗 Share this article Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burning Story of Family and Intimacy in a South Korean Frontier Town Inspired by the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, trapped between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction. Everyday Existence and Upheaval When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely. Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in bursts of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s parent and partner both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit adjacent to the main story, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in the guesthouse. Performances and Directorial Approach The trio of strong acts at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story. Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from 7 November.