Sokcho in Winter Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Story of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Adapted from a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing drama follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s first feature also resides in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, trapped between dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Upheaval
If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially matching her prejudices about rude French men, he turns out, after an online search, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he manages to extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of clandestine, winding moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan stays a distant figure, insisting on his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her desires 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 mother and boyfriend both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.
Winter in Sokcho can be seen on Mubi from 7 November.
