Winter in Sokcho Review: A Moody Slow-Burning Tale of Family and Closeness in a South Korean Border City
Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. Once the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Upheaval
If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the foreigner settles in for a extended visit. At first conforming to her prejudices about rude French men, he proves, after an online search, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the story 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 something else.
Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of physical constraint and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan remains a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s profession, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Acting and Directorial Approach
The three focused performances at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on 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.
