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The Last Princess (2016) has been getting attention after it was announced that it will be released in Japan. Although it is rare for a movie set during the Japanese occupation of Korea to be released in Japan, the film will be shown in 20 to 30 theaters from June 24th. 

Known for melodramas such as Christmas in August (1998), One Fine Spring Day (2001) and A Good Rain Knows (2009), HUR Jin-ho directed The Last Princess which is an adaptation of GWON Bi-young’s novel Princess Deok-hye, which was released in Korea in August of 2016. It is based on the true story of Korea’s last princess who was taken to Japan at an early age as a hostage during the Colonial Era and never returned. The film is about Princess Deok-hye (SON Ye-jin) being reunited with her childhood friend Jang-han (PARK Hae-il) and becoming part of a secret operation to move Deok-hye and her brother King Young-chin to Shanghai. Financed and distributed by Lotte Entertainment, the film was a box office hit, bringing in 5.6 million moviegoers in Korea. 

However, the question is, how will Japanese audiences accept the movie. Last July, CHOI Dong-hoon’s colonial thriller Assassination (2015) was released in Japan but couldn’t expand its market size while CHO Jung-rae’s Spirits’ Homecoming (2016) about Japanese military sexual enslavement had only limited screenings in Japan instead of opening in theaters. HARK, which distributed The Last Princess followed by Assassination in Japan, said on its website (www.lastprincess.info) “The Last Princess, based on a real person, is a spectacular drama in which SON Ye-jin of A Moment To Remember (2004) and April Snow (2005) plays Korea’s last princess.”