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Based on the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Dusapin, this elusive yet bracing drama follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives French writer Yan (Roschdy Zem) 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 French father while she was still in utero, caught between two cultures. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to accompany the mysterious author, she loiters uncomfortably between tetchy friendship and complex desire.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying spectacular-looking seafood prepared by her fishmonger mother (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an hopeful model gunning for a relocation to the capital. But this comfy routine is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a extended visit. At first matching her biases about rude French men, he proves, on Googling him, to be acclaimed comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in pursuit of creative fuel, he manages to prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a vent – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings surface in flashes of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan stays a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and sparing with particulars of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this imbalance hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and restraint, with Sooha’s parent and partner both advocating cosmetic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. Yet despite Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the centre – an almost hostile Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park – give Winter in Sokcho its emotional anchor, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the wary faceoff between hotelier and visitor, he is consistently on his toes emotionally speaking, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on absence, on the verge of succumb in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.

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