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Adapted from the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her father from France while she was still unborn, caught between dual heritages. After the francophone hostess is compelled to accompany the mysterious author, she lingers uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes prepared by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a move to the capital. But this familiar rhythm is disrupted when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. At first matching her prejudices about rude French men, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he manages to extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in bursts of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and release. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan stays a distant figure, insisting on his loner ethic and stingy with particulars of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. But despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the cautious standoff between innkeeper and visitor, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over absence, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho can be seen on the streaming service from November 7.