Winter in Sokcho Analysis: A Moody Slow-Burn Tale of Family and Intimacy in a South Korean Border City
Based on the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, left behind by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Daily Life and Upheaval
When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to Seoul. However this comfy routine is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a extended visit. At first conforming to her prejudices 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 succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his loner ethic and stingy with details of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a key theme for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit adjacent to the main story, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.
Acting and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a tactile visual register. Obsessing over absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.
The film is available on the streaming service from 7 November.
