Koya Kamura
Winter in Sockcho

Film winner of the Best Director award at the Bergamo Film Meeting 2025

Sometimes it strikes like a spark, maybe it's just me being more receptive at that moment, but it happens. Recently, I must admit, very rarely, but last night at the Circolo del Cinema in Verona, where I saw this beautiful film previewed, it happened.

I immediately felt at ease during the viewing of "Winter in Sockcho". Mainly thanks to an extraordinary direction that managed to create a unique atmosphere, with a narrative composed mainly of small everyday gestures, intimacy, profiles delineated and drawn in sudden animations, chess games where the brilliant protagonist takes turns challenging her mother and the comic book writer, moving pieces made of feelings, curiosity, revelations, discoveries, emotions. However, the setting is equally important; this city on the border between the two Koreas allows the scope to be broadened, letting History with a capital H enter the narrative's development, even in brief touches and sequences, but sufficient to provide a broader perspective.

I spoke of profiles, and in the true sense of the word, lines of bodies stroked gently, lines traced by real and imagined brushes in beautiful animated sequences, enriching the most intense moments with poetry. But even the stunning rocky mountain landscapes present their unchanged profiles over time, evoking other bodies, other stories or local legends, perhaps real or invented at the moment.

The characters are skillfully constructed through a few hints, some memories, and brief pieces of information gathered from the internet. But their character is mainly delineated through images (we're talking about great cinema, not by chance), through work, gestures, the intimate relationship between the protagonist and her mother, touch, memories, the hesitations in revealing hidden truths.
The almost animalistic instinct of the enigmatic French cartoonist in smelling, tasting inks, brushes, paper, his abrupt and direct manners show us a strong personality, but with cracks (the fist on the table that makes the ink splash) that only probing, studying new places and people can temporarily mend in anticipation of a new journey, a new inspiration. Deep down, he is a thief, as perhaps all writers are; he steals from the reality that surrounds him, takes the information he needs, exploits (but without malice, it's an existential necessity for him) the people who might be useful to him, sucking their essence, but limiting himself to the necessary, he does not go beyond, he's honest in that regard. Certainly, little or nothing returns from what he has received, ultimately never explicitly asking. A drawing of her left on the nightstand, a very dry way of saying thank you, in line with the character.
She, on the other hand, is very sweet, a girl raised only by her mother, the French father (the connection with the cartoonist is all too evident) never known, manages as a jack-of-all-trades cook in the small guest house, economically threatened by the construction of three large hotels. She is cultured, has studied French literature in Seoul, and lives in the city of Sokcho mainly to be close to her mother, another strong personality who runs a stall at the fish market. She has a relationship with a nice and charming boy, as aesthetically beautiful as he is superficial and empty inside. The arrival of the foreign guest, of the same nationality as the never-known father, and the natural curiosity for someone of a higher intellectual level than those around her, could only create a disturbance in her life and eventually become an occasion for emotional and existential growth.

The direction plays with all this material exceptionally, with sequences and shots always carefully thought out, whether the characters are alone (the marvelous scene of her in the bathroom with the brush and the misted mirror), or interacting with others (often in two-person situations, the chess games I mentioned before) and, as if that weren't enough, inserting animated scenes that always start with line tracing (profiles, how important I said they are) and go on to sublimate real situations (see the beautiful last love scene between her and her boyfriend).

What remains at the end of such a full, delicate, and dense viewing? The feeling of having lived alongside these characters, of having shared their sensations, the flavors of the food and its preparation (another supporting contribution, but very carefully crafted and not insignificant within the film), the smells, the winter landscape, so white, cold, and chilly, contrasting with the warmth coming from the people who for barely two hours warmed my old heart and I imagine also that of many others in the theater.

Thank you Koya Kamura, director of this small great cinematic gem, for what you have managed to give us.