Koya Kamura’s Winter in Sokcho has viewers seeing Sooha (Bella Kim), who works at a seaside hotel that Mr. Park (Ryu Tae-ho) owns. During the titular season, her hotel has a guest, Yan Kerrand (Roschdy Zem), a French artist. Yan is particular, needing particular materials to create what one assumes is his next graphic novel. Park assigns Sooha as Yan’s chaperone because they both speak French. Sooha watches him from up close while still making time for her Mother (Park Mi-hyeon) and her Aunt (Jung Kyung-soon). She also makes time for her boyfriend Joon-Oh (Gong Do-yu), although his shallowness infuriates her. She breaks it off with him and starts having complex feelings for Yan, even moving closer to him.

This isn’t part of Mubi’s Food on Film retro, but it might as well be because of how food factors into this film. This is also a film with a lot of metaphors –  one critic even saw symbolism with Sooha and Yan’s trip to DMZ. And the many dishes and dinners here serve as metaphors. When Sooha voices the desire to cook like her mother, her mother brushes it off as nonsense. Food also plays into Sooha and Yan’s relationship which turns tense when she teaches him, as an example, how to use chopsticks. Winter in Sochko sees food as a way for these characters to mark their territory in ways. Food enriches a story about a protagonist in perpetual discontent, reaching for acceptance that eludes her.

The story of Winter in Sokcho has elements of this even with other characters like Joon-ah. Both he and Sooha’s mother symbolize a culture that seemingly judges people, seeing beauty as a high standard. Another symbol of this is a Bandaged Woman (Ki Hui-hyeon), who gets the surgeries that both her mother and Joon-ah want for her even if she’s pretty enough as she is. Her ancestry is also an element in the film, a daughter of a missing French man. That’s good and everything, but sometimes the elements here feel that instead of cohering into a whole. The deliberate pacing here doesn’t help to build into something even more than halfway into the film.

An hour in, it feels like all the action adds up to little consequence so far. Kamura’s choices when it comes to framing and lighting don’t always add up to me as well. The animation segments, apparently reflecting Yan’s work, also feel a little simple in Winter in Sokcho. But thankfully, it gives us the third act payoff that one expects from any film, even slow burns. This is a film that requires repeat viewings – writing about this has its surprises and hidden rewards. It also works as a cultural capsule – one can even see the cultural implications of Sooha’s emotions. Lastly, the ending is the right mix of funny and mean, as Sooha goes through what we go through.

Stream Winter in Sokcho on MUBI, which-