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Inspired by the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts author from France 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 spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is compelled to accompany the mysterious 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 mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a move to the capital. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a extended visit. At first matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he manages to extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Thematic Depth

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of clandestine, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan stays a distant figure, upholding his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, 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 partner both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an almost hostile Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

The film can be seen on the streaming service from 7 November.