Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burning Tale of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a South Korean Border City
Adapted from a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's debut film also camps in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Disruption
When she’s not digging into visually stunning seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. Initially matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he manages to prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent 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 Thematic Depth
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of clandestine, winding moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s mother and partner both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious bandaged diner 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-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over absence, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film is available on the streaming service from November 7.
