Sokcho in Winter Review: A Moody Slow-Burn Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a Korean Frontier Town

Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing drama follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also resides in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, trapped between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is compelled to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a move to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first conforming to her biases about rude French men, he turns out, on Googling him, to be critically lauded 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 observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a distant figure, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is intentional – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both advocating plastic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s profession, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in residence.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-absorbed 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 consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from 7 November.