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Adapted from the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, trapped between two cultures. Once the francophone hostess is compelled to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Upheaval

If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a move to the capital. However this comfy routine is disrupted when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about rude French men, he proves, on Googling him, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account 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 something else.

Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of clandestine, sinuous moments of physical constraint and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – 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 profession, it feels a bit adjacent to the main story, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in residence.

Acting and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the centre – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of succumb in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from 7 November.