Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Tale of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Inspired by the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's debut film also camps in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. Once the French-speaking employee is compelled to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Disruption
If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model aiming for a move to the capital. But this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he manages to extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s buried emotions surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and stingy with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit adjacent to the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The three focused performances at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the wary faceoff between hotelier and visitor, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over emptiness, on the verge of succumb in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film is available on the streaming service from 7 November.
