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Adapted from the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet bracing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) 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 debut film also resides in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still unborn, caught between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she loiters uneasily between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking marine dishes cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a relocation to the capital. But this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the story of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and release. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his loner ethic and sparing with details of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother 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 wrapped guest also in residence.

Performances and Cinematic Craft

The trio of strong acts at the core – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, threatening to succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho can be seen on Mubi from November 7.