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Based on the book by Korean-Swiss writer Elisa Shua Dusapin, this elusive yet refreshing drama centers on hotel employee Sooha (Bella Kim) as she escorts author from France Yan (Zem Roschdy) to the demilitarised zone just north of the city of Sokcho. Symbolism abounds: Koya Kamura’s debut film also camps in a liminal space of the spirit, with Sooha, abandoned by her French father while she was still unborn, trapped between two cultures. Once the francophone hostess is forced to accompany the enigmatic author, she lingers uneasily between strained companionship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning seafood cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Gong Do-yu), an aspiring model aiming for a move to Seoul. But this familiar rhythm is overturned when the foreigner takes up residence for a long-term stay. Initially matching her prejudices about rude French men, he turns out, after an online search, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Coming to Sokcho in search of creative fuel, 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 proxy father, or another figure entirely.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of clandestine, sinuous moments of bodily suffocation and liberation. We are privy to only her inner life, though; Yan stays a remote presence, insisting on his solitary principles and sparing with particulars of his history. His cipher status, as Sooha projects her desires on to him, is deliberate – but this one-sidedness hinders Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s parent and boyfriend both pushing cosmetic surgery on her – is evidently a central idea for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit separate from the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in the guesthouse.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The trio of strong acts at the centre – an nearly aggressive Zem, increasingly scattered Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – provide Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully narratively contain the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is consistently on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a physical, sensory imagery. Fixating on absence, threatening to drown in subjective feelings, Kamura creates an intriguing kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.