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Inspired by the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing film follows hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also camps in a liminal space of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she lingers uncomfortably between strained companionship and complex desire.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is relaxing with her partner (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation to the capital. However this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider settles in for a extended visit. At first matching her biases about impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, after an online search, to be acclaimed graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of inspiration, he succeeds in extract the account of Sooha’s missing father from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a surrogate parent, or something else.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in bursts of secret, winding moments of physical constraint and release. We witness only her internal world, though; Yan remains a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and stingy with details of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is deliberate – 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 evidently a key theme for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s profession, it seems a bit separate from the main story, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in residence.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura can’t quite narratively contain the wary faceoff between hotelier and guest, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of drown in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.