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Adapted from the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, caught between dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the mysterious author, she lingers uneasily between strained companionship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a relocation to Seoul. However this comfy routine is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, 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 surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in bursts of clandestine, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme 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 the guesthouse.

Acting and Directorial Approach

The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on emptiness, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

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