Sokcho in Winter Review: A Moody Slow-Burning Story of Familial Bonds and Closeness in a Korean Border City
Based on a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Disruption
When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to the capital. However this comfy routine is disrupted when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the story 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 another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in bursts of clandestine, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and sparing with particulars of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit adjacent to the main story, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in residence.
Acting and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.
Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from 7 November.
