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Adapted from a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing drama centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still in utero, trapped between two cultures. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the enigmatic author, she lingers uneasily between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a move to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is overturned when the foreigner settles in for a long-term stay. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a surrogate parent, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in bursts of secret, winding moments of physical constraint and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and visitor, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Obsessing over absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

The film can be seen on Mubi from November 7.