Electriclimefilms director Hopi Allard on igniting his imagination and the impact of filmmaking during the pandemic
Electriclimefilms director Hopi Allard’s body of work is a marriage between the ethereal and visceral.
Each story by the UK-based filmmaker is told humbly, but with finesse and he traverses genres effortlessly – each project wielding a still, authentic voice.
His past collaborations include Adidas x Stella McCartney, Prada, Marc Jacobs, BBC and Vans.
Allard has previously worked on a successful Al Dar ‘Mamsha Al Saadiyat’ project with electriclimefilms in the Middle East, creating abstract and dreamlike scenes to give the film texture and ambiguity as it jumps around in time and space.
And Allard, who electriclimefilms represent in the APAC and Middle East regions, has described where he gets his inspirations from.
Says Allard: “My approach is usually the same: work out the essence of the idea and try and keep that safe throughout the raging storm of production problems that arise, rolling with inevitable punches and embracing compromise that is almost always necessary.
“It’s the micro ideas that come to you when your doing something else that end up igniting your imagination or solving that creative problem.
“They usually exist as a bunch of weird notes and scribbles in a pad that would mean almost nothing to anyone else. The trick is trying to tap back into that initial spark, feeling or image and use it in your work.”
The pandemic has, of course, had a major impact around the world and the filmmaking process has had to adapt to new ways.
With some productions shutting down; agencies, clients and production houses had to find a new way to create the vsion they were after.
And Allard adds that creatives have found a new way to work when required: “I count myself as very fortunate that the pandemic hasn’t yet profoundly effected me in a very negative way. I did, of course, go through the angst of financial worry, having had many projects slip away.
“I found i needed to adapt to a different rhythm at home with no childcare in a kind of forced sabbatical from work. And for this I retrospectively feel very lucky.
“I guess this time taught me that creativity is a feeling and how you present yourself at all times (even outside of work) effect your outlook and, in turn, your output.
“I definitely now have an enlarged appreciation for the small moments and try to embrace more regularly opportunities to be under stimulated. I am truly grateful for the lessons I learnt about patient, present and seeing the bigger picture.
“On a practical level I also learnt it is possible to successfully direct remotely.”
To read the full interview and see Allard’s work, click here.
