Fans want Harvard student’s Disney-style film about Korean princess to make it to big screen

‘I was really inspired by my grandparents, and my experience in college – and that’s sort of how I found my way to “Shimcheong: A Folktale”,’ 22-year-old Julia Riew said

Harvard student’s Disney-style film about Korean princess goes viral on TikTok (Instagram/@mjtotoro)

Fans want 22-year-old Harvard student Julia Riew’s viral, Disney-style film about a Korean princess to make it to the silver screen.

Riew, who grew up in St Louis, Missouri, had been writing musicals since she was 15 before her seventh full musical to date, Shimcheong: A Folktale, attracted widespread attention.

An adaptation of Korean folktale The Blind Man’s Daughter, the one-act musical follows courageous protagonist Shimcheong’s fantastical journey after she falls into the ocean trying to save her father.

With all the components of a Disney fairytale, Riew’s movie includes an unfamiliar dragon kingdom, a plucky escape plan, a Prince Charming, and a villainous dragon queen. But it is the first Disney-style movie to feature a Korean princess.

A third generation Korean-American, Riew began working on Shimcheong for her senior year thesis project at Harvard but never expected it to became an internet sensation, after she began posting snippets of the story and songs on TikTok.

The first song that attracted users to Riew’s project was “Dive”. The track has earned nearly one million views since she posted a 41-second clip of herself, animated as a Disney princess, singing the uplifting song.

Its lyrics read: “Now all of the fish in the sea can’t stop me // All of the waves in the world can’t rock me // I’m on a mission and gee // just watch me go!”

Riew said she drew inspiration for her ambitious project “from a lot of different places” including her grandparents and her experiences in college.

During her freshman year at Harvard, Riew realised there was a lack of Asian representation within the school’s theatre community.

“That sort of made me feel like, ‘Oh, maybe this isn’t the thing for me,’ but, at the same time, it fuelled my desire to want to create more of a space for the Asian students on campus who might not have discovered theatre,” she told CNN.

She said the buzz around her film began in America and “then it started trending on Korean Twitter”. Riew told the broadcaster she’s grateful to all the parents who are writing in to her and telling her they want Shimcheong to make it to cinemas.

“That is really the thing that warms my heart most of all,” she said.