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Adapted from a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s debut film also resides in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. Once the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a relocation to the capital. But this comfy routine is disrupted when the foreigner takes up residence for a extended visit. Initially conforming to her prejudices about rude French men, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his loner ethic and stingy with details of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and partner both pushing plastic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit separate from the main story, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The trio of strong acts at the centre – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and visitor, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.

The film can be seen on Mubi from November 7.