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Based on a novel by Swiss-Korean writer Elisa Dusapin, this subtle yet refreshing film follows guesthouse worker Sooha (Kim Bella) as she drives author from France Yan (Roschdy Zem) to the demilitarised zone just north of Sokcho. Metaphor alert: Director Kamura's first feature also resides in a no man’s land of the soul, with Sooha, left behind by her French father while she was still in utero, caught between dual heritages. Once the French-speaking employee is forced to chaperone the enigmatic author, she lingers uneasily between tetchy friendship and Oedipal attraction.

Daily Life and Disruption

If not enjoying visually stunning marine dishes cooked by her fishmonger mother (Mi-hyeon Park), Sooha is lolling about with her boyfriend (Do-yu Gong), an aspiring model aiming for a relocation to the capital. However this comfy routine is overturned when the outsider takes up residence for a long-term stay. At first matching her biases about rude French men, he proves, on Googling him, to be critically lauded graphic novelist Yan Kerrand. Arriving in Sokcho in pursuit of inspiration, he succeeds in prise the story of Sooha’s absent parent from her. She observes him through a air duct – but it remains to be seen whether he’s a proxy father, or something else.

Emotional Landscape and Symbolic Layers

Sooha’s buried emotions surface in bursts of secret, sinuous moments of physical constraint and liberation. We are privy to only her internal world, though; Yan stays a remote presence, upholding his solitary principles and sparing with particulars of his past. His enigmatic role, as Sooha imposes her needs on to him, is intentional – but this one-sidedness prevents Winter in Sokcho from fully opening up. Aesthetic expression – and control, with Sooha’s mother and boyfriend both pushing plastic surgery on her – is clearly a key theme for Kamura. But despite Yan’s profession, it feels a bit adjacent to the primary narrative, like the enigmatic wrapped guest also in residence.

Acting and Cinematic Craft

The three focused performances at the core – an nearly aggressive Zem, progressively unmoored Bella Kim, and the self-involved Park Mi-hyeon – give Winter in Sokcho its solid centre, and if Kamura doesn't fully thematically corral the wary faceoff between innkeeper and guest, he is always on his toes in terms of feeling, often exploring a tactile visual register. Fixating on absence, threatening to succumb in internal sensations, Kamura creates an fascinating kind of modern ghost story.

Winter in Sokcho is available on Mubi from 7 November.