Korea's 'Princess Bari' Animation News

According to recent reports, a unique Korean animated feature film has wrapped production after several years of development and co-production efforts. Though highly popularized at the time of its initial production five to six years ago, the animated film Princess Bari is the result of a joint-investment from three separate nations but features distinct and predominant themes, values and storytelling from a Korean cultural perspective. The story of a princess who risks her own life through perilous journey to save the lives of others, as adapted from Korean folk storytelling (of the tale of Bari Deghi), the animated movie Princess Bari is a promising chronology of restoring balance in a chaotic and dissonant society. The film is not only recently completed but is also scheduled for international distribution.

Princess Bari is more than a simple adventure tale though; it is the story of one young woman's exile, and this woman's determination to be more than a mere abandonment to those who once scoffed at her existence. Hailed as a story whose literary value is of one of the most crucial to developing a valid female presence/identity in ancient and contemporary Korea, the tale of Barideghi / Princess Bari possess hope and intrigue. Bari, the seventh daughter to a distraught king and his wife, is at the center of this folk legend.

But given the anxious, chauvinist king's desire for a son, he mercilessly orders the seventh baby girl to be thrown away. Raised by a kind old man and his wife with the assistance of Buddha, Princess Bari is saved, but raised apart from her royal heritage for many years.

When Bari is older (age unknown but presumed late teenaged years), she decides to return to her home to visit her parents after having been separated from them for so long. As Princess Bari continues, the young woman learns that as punishment for abandoning Bari as a child, the King and his wife are stricken deathly ill by Heaven. The only thing that can save the King is the Water of Life, which resides in the underworld.

A legend of feminine strength, worldly knowledge and the ever-present value of Buddhist teachings, Princess Bari sees the older, more mature Bari embarking on a journey to locate this water of Life… through the innumerous dangers of the land of the dead, in part to save the family she innately cares for, but also so as to find her own identity in a world culture that has relegated her to nothing more than an abandoned child.

Receiving production funding from China and France in addition to Korean resources, the feature animated film production of Princess Bari has reportedly come to a completion after years of what may be characterized as indifferent scheduling. Interested parties, such as director Jang Sun-woo, have been involved in developing the property for several years; all the meanwhile additional supporting roles for production, such as Producer or principal financier, have fluctuated for the past three years or more. Animation production for Princess Bari was completed by Mago21 (Oseam, White Heart, Baekgu) through a hybrid of traditional 2D animation and computer animation; and had a sizeable budget of approximately 4.5 billion Korean Won (approx. USD 5,000,000), according to sources; of which part of said budget (KRW 400,000,000 / USD 441,750) came from the Korean Film Council, a government-supported body that assists in the management and promotion of select Korean filmmaking.