Winter in Sokcho Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Tale of Familial Bonds and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Adapted from the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing drama 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 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. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she lingers uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.
Daily Life and Upheaval
If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model gunning for a move to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first conforming to her biases about rude French men, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of inspiration, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.
Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and sparing with details of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s parent and partner both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in residence.
Acting and Cinematic Craft
The three focused performances at the centre – 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 wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film can be seen on the streaming service from November 7.
