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Adapted from a novel by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the DMZ just north of the city of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Koya Kamura’s debut film also resides 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 dual heritages. After the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she lingers uneasily between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her mother who sells fish (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her partner (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model gunning for a move to Seoul. However this familiar rhythm is overturned when the outsider settles in for a long-term stay. At first matching her prejudices about impolite Frenchmen, he proves, after an online search, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he manages to extract the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions erupt in flashes of clandestine, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan remains a distant figure, upholding his loner ethic and sparing with details of his past. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and partner both advocating plastic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.

Performances and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an almost hostile Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park – give 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 dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in internal sensations, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.