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Based on a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing drama follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the mysterious author, she loiters uneasily between strained companionship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Upheaval

When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider takes up residence for a extended visit. At first conforming to her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he manages to prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and stingy with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Visual style – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Directorial Approach

The three focused performances at the core – an almost hostile Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

The film is available on the streaming service from 7 November.