Winter in Sokcho Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burning Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a South Korean Border City

Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film centers on hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Koya Kamura’s debut film also resides in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between two cultures. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Upheaval

If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model gunning for a move to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the foreigner settles in for a extended visit. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in bursts of secret, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan remains a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and partner both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The three focused performances at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and visitor, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over absence, on the verge of succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

The film is available on Mubi from 7 November.