[1] The production won a TV Drama Award at the 2008 Festival of the Arts of the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs (文化庁芸術祭).
[2] The story takes place in Maoka City, Karafuto, Japan (Currently Kholmsk, Sakhalin, Russian Federation) during the final year of the Pacific War.
The Soviet Union's occupation of Karafuto is a very sensitive topic and controversial in both Russia and Japan due to the previous border dispute between the two countries.
A 1974 movie titled Karafuto 1945 Summer Hyosetsu no Mon (樺太1945年夏 氷雪の門) portrayed the event as an invasion by the Red Army that claimed the lives of thousands.
Kiri no Hi caused less political uproar from Russia due to the movie's insistence as "fiction" and it did not focus on the Red Army's brutal actions but instead talked about world peace.