Sokcho in Winter Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Story of Family and Intimacy in a Korean Frontier Town

Based on the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's debut film also resides in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Upheaval

When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. But this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. Initially matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in bursts of clandestine, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan stays a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is intentional – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and partner both advocating plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s profession, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the core – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the cautious standoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a tactile visual register. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

The film is available on the streaming service from 7 November.