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Inspired by a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing film centers on hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film 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, caught between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is compelled to accompany the mysterious author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and release. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan remains a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and stingy with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and partner both advocating plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in residence.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and visitor, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on absence, on the verge of drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.