Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Story of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a Korean Border City
Inspired by a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's debut film also camps in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, trapped between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is compelled to accompany the enigmatic author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Upheaval
If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. However this comfy routine is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.
Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in flashes of clandestine, sinuous moments of physical constraint and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, 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 mother and partner both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.
The film is available on the streaming service from November 7.