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Based on a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, trapped between dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

When she’s not digging into visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to Seoul. However this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. At first matching her biases about rude French men, he proves, after an online search, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he manages to prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The three focused performances at the core – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, on the verge of drown in internal sensations, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho can be seen on the streaming service from November 7.