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Based on the book by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she escorts author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the DMZ just north of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still unborn, caught between two cultures. After the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she lingers uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Everyday Existence and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her mother who sells fish (Park Mi-hyeon), Sooha is relaxing with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an hopeful model aiming for a relocation 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 impolite Frenchmen, he turns out, on Googling him, to be critically lauded comic book writer Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, he manages to prise the account of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She spies on him through a air duct – but the question lingers whether he’s a proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Inner Turmoil and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s subterranean feelings erupt in flashes of secret, winding moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha projects her needs on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from reaching its full potential. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s mother and partner both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. Yet in spite of Yan’s vocation, it seems a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the mysterious bandaged diner also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the core – an nearly aggressive Roschdy Zem, progressively unmoored Kim, and the self-absorbed Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the cautious standoff between hotelier and visitor, he is always on his toes emotionally speaking, often dipping into a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on emptiness, on the verge of drown in subjective feelings, Kamura musters an intriguing kind of contemporary phantom tale.

Winter in Sokcho is available on the streaming service from November 7.