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Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ 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 French father while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a move to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. Initially matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his loner ethic and stingy with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both advocating plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

The film can be seen on Mubi from November 7.