Winter in Sokcho Review: A Moody Slow-Burn Story of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Based on a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's first feature also camps 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 two cultures. After the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Disruption
When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a move to Seoul. However this comfy routine is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.
Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of physical constraint and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan remains a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and partner both pushing plastic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.
Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.
