Sokcho in Winter Review: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Tale of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a Korean Border City
Inspired by a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s first feature also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is compelled to accompany the mysterious author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Upheaval
When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a move to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first matching her biases about rude French men, he proves, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in bursts of clandestine, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and sparing with details of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the main story, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in residence.
Performances and Cinematic Craft
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.
Winter in Sokcho can be seen on Mubi from November 7.
