Over the years, between the big and the small screen, we have seen strong princesses, ready to fight and defend their honor.
However, none of this is comparable to The Princess , the new 20th Century Studios film coming to Disney + on July 1, 2022.
Directed by Le-Van Kiet ( Furie ) and starring Emmy Award nominee Joey King ( The Act, The Kissing Booth ), the film tells the story of a beautiful and tenacious princess, who refuses to marry the cruel sociopath to whom she was betrothed and, for this very reason, she is kidnapped and locked up in a remote tower of her father’s castle.
With the suitor rejected and bent on revenge by usurping the throne, the princess is called upon to protect her family and save her kingdom in an action-packed fight to the death.
The movie trailer
We recently attended a virtual press conference, during which the director and the protagonist presented the film.
With them also the actress Veronica Ngo , who in the past had already collaborated with Le-Van Kiet , but not in a film like this:
This is the third time I’ve worked with Kiet, but it’s also the first time I’ve seen a different side of him. He has made very dark films in the past, when he called me to tell me that he was going to make a film about princesses I said, “What?”.
In any case, the actress reiterated that this film is for certain truly unique:
It is the first time ever that you will see a princess story like this.
The Raid meets the world of fairy tales
But how exactly could this film be described? Some useful information was given to us by director Le-Van Kiet , who talked about his sources of inspiration.
Stories driven by very tough characters. I like the kind of subtle humor used in Die Hard. But The Raid seriously inspired us to make the action tougher, to feel every punch, the survival instinct that emerges in the chaos. So there is all of this but it’s also a lot of fun.
With this awareness, the story was then developed, giving action a central role:
It all started with the character. We knew Joey was going to be the princess and we knew what kind of person he was and all. Part of the humor comes from Joey. So we made sure the action felt believable for the character. Then came the design. With a film like this, our main concern was not to make it boring. In each scene Joey is fighting something she doesn’t want to face, but she has to.
Action first of all
And speaking of Joey King , the actress had to face a particularly physical role for the first time, with a lot of courage but also a bit of initial fear:
This film scared me a lot, but that really pushed me to do it.
And the actress has seriously donated body and soul to her character, tackling most of the most dangerous scenes firsthand, as confirmed by the director:
We didn’t plan for him to shoot all of his scenes.
As Joey King pointed out , the warmth and trust of the people around her made it all possible:
The only reason I felt free to play my scenes is because Kiet, Veronica and the whole stunt team have always supported me. Nobody ever told me I couldn’t make it. I had never done something like this before.
Being surrounded by all these people who believe in you and tell you, “You don’t know if you can do it? I know you can “.
Proud of the result, the actress then added:
I couldn’t be more proud and excited that people can see this movie. Everyone got a taste thanks to the trailer. But that’s definitely not what you expect.
The cast of The Princess also features Dominic Cooper ( Preacher ) and Olga Kurylenko ( Black Widow ). The film is written by Ben Lustig ( The Thirst ) and Jake Thornton ( Final Fantasy ) and produced by Neal H. Moritz (the Fast and Furious franchise ), Toby Jaffe ( Total Recall ) and Derek Kolstad ( John Wick ), while Joey King and Guy Riedel are executive producers.