Sokcho in Winter Review: A Moody Slow-Burning Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a South Korean Frontier Town
Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also resides in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. Once the French-speaking employee is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Everyday Existence and Disruption
When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a extended visit. At first matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he manages to prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in bursts of clandestine, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan stays a distant figure, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes 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 partner both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in residence.
Performances and Cinematic Craft
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over absence, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.
The film can be seen on Mubi from November 7.
