Sokcho in Winter Analysis: An Atmospheric Slow-Burn Tale of Family and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Inspired by a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing film centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s first feature also resides in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she lingers uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.
Everyday Existence and Upheaval
If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, on Googling him, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.
Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and stingy with particulars of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the main story, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in residence.
Performances and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.
The film can be seen on Mubi from 7 November.
