Sokcho in Winter Analysis: A Moody Slow-Burning Tale of Family and Closeness in a Korean Frontier Town
Inspired by the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Bella Kim) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is compelled to chaperone the enigmatic author, she lingers uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.
Everyday Existence and Disruption
When she’s not digging into visually stunning seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a move to Seoul. However this comfy routine is disrupted when the foreigner settles in for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed 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 spies on him through a vent – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.
Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers
Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of clandestine, sinuous moments of physical constraint and release. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his history. His enigmatic role, 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 mother and partner both advocating plastic 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 enigmatic bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.
Acting and Directorial Approach
The trio of strong acts at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.
Winter in Sokcho can be seen on Mubi from 7 November.
