Sokcho in Winter Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burning Story of Family and Intimacy in a South Korean Frontier Town
Based on the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.
Everyday Existence and Disruption
If not enjoying visually stunning seafood prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a move to Seoul. But this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of clandestine, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Acting and Cinematic Craft
The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.
Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from 7 November.
