🔗 Share this article Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Story of Family and Intimacy in a South Korean Frontier Town Inspired by a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: 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, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction. Everyday Existence and Disruption When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a relocation to Seoul. 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, after an online search, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely. Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in bursts of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his solitary principles and stingy with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in residence. Acting and Cinematic Craft The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the cautious standoff between hotelier and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, on the verge of succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story. The film can be seen on the streaming service from 7 November.