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Adapted from a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ 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 French father while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. Once the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model aiming for a move to Seoul. But this comfy routine is disrupted when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially conforming to 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 inspiration, he manages to extract the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes 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 buried emotions erupt in bursts of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and partner both advocating plastic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the core – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and visitor, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho can be seen on the streaming service from 7 November.