Sokcho in Winter Analysis: A Moody Slow-Burning Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a South Korean Border City
Adapted from the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Koya Kamura’s first feature also resides in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, caught between dual heritages. Once the francophone hostess is forced to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.
Everyday Existence and Upheaval
When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a move to the capital. However this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a extended visit. Initially conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he succeeds in extract the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in bursts of secret, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan stays a remote presence, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Acting and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, on the verge of succumb in internal sensations, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film can be seen on the streaming service from November 7.
