Winter in Sokcho Review: A Moody Slow-Burning Story of Family and Closeness in a Korean Border City
Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Disruption
When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model gunning for a relocation to the capital. But this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially conforming to her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.
Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of clandestine, winding moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the main story, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, on the verge of drown in internal sensations, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film can be seen on the streaming service from 7 November.
