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Adapted from the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Koya Kamura’s first feature also camps in a no man’s land of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the enigmatic author, she loiters uncomfortably between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Disruption

When she’s not digging into spectacular-looking seafood cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model gunning for a relocation to the capital. But this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he succeeds in extract 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 proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We witness only her inner life, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and sparing with details of his history. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Visual style – and control, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s vocation, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Obsessing over emptiness, on the verge of drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.