Winter in Sokcho Analysis: A Moody Slow-Burn Tale of Family and Closeness in a South Korean Frontier Town
Adapted from the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s first feature also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still in utero, trapped between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is forced to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Upheaval
When she’s not digging into visually stunning seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially matching her prejudices about rude French men, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he manages to extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.
Emotional Landscape and Thematic Depth
Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in bursts of clandestine, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders 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 evidently a key theme for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.
Performances and Cinematic Craft
The trio of strong acts at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, on the verge of drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.
The film can be seen on the streaming service from 7 November.
