Sokcho in Winter Review: A Moody Slow-Burn Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a Korean Border City
Based on a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still in utero, trapped between dual heritages. Once the French-speaking employee is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uneasily between strained companionship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Disruption
If not enjoying visually stunning seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model gunning for a move to the capital. But 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 proves, on Googling him, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both advocating plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in residence.
Performances and Cinematic Craft
The three focused performances at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored 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 in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.
Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.
