Director Adria Petty, who’s handled by aWHITELABELproduct in the U.S. and Skinflicks in the U.K., teamed up with longtime collaborator, Stardust creative director Alan Bibby, to co-write and co-direct Coldplay and Rihanna’s music video for “Princess of China.”
Petty, whose credits include videos for Beyonce’s “Sweet Dreams” and “Countdown” plus spots for Target, Hershey’s and Lancome, and Bibby, whose credits include VFX-heavy commercials for Mercedes-Benz, AT&T and Shell, combined their talents for the movie-trailer-style Coldplay/Rihanna video, which recently premiered worldwide.
Blending iconic elements from kung fu films and samurai epics, “Princess of China” is a visual fantasy that pays homage to Petty and Bibby’s favorite films and scenes. The directors embraced Asian influences from multiple countries and eras to round out the video’s visual world. “We love old kung fu movies, the Shaw Brothers, all of that,” Bibby explained. “This began as a love letter to that genre, but we also wanted to make it much broader and just go way over the top with it. The Japanese taiko drums, the Guanyin multi-arm imagery, the Southeast Asian architecture, the hair and modern fashion–it was this mix of visual elements that really created the immersive world for this story.”
SUPERLATIVE Signs Director Claudia Abend For Spots and Branded Content
Latin American director/editor and documentary filmmaker Claudia Abend has joined SUPERLATIVE for her first U.S. representation spanning commercials and branded content.
Abend's empathetic docu-style POV has garnered several international awards for the documentary films Hit (2008) and The Flower of Life (2018). Her spotmaking credits include such brands as Procter & Gamble, Nestle and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. SUPERLATIVE has already worked with Abend, together producing a new ad campaign for digital agency Tinuiti and The Honest Company, a consumer goods corporation featuring eco-minded products.
“We found Claudia through her poignant documentaries on the festival circuit,” said SUPERLATIVE creative manager Stefan Dezil. “We are excited about her textured narratives, emotional storytelling, and her powerhouse long-form storytelling abilities, currently on her third feature film. As SUPERLATIVE continues to build our brand after premiering our latest films at Sundance and SXSW, Claudia is the kind of multidimensional artist we are excited to partner with on branded content and beyond. Fluent in English and Spanish, her reel shows real prowess with infants, food and skin products, families both young and old. Great visual storytelling and inspirational doc work.”
Abend began her career in her native Uruguay, studying film and editing in college. “My dad would show me films like Citizen Kane,” she said. “I love cinema and became an editor. It was here that I learned all about communicating human emotion.”
From the get-go, Abend hit it big as a documentary director, teaming with Adrianna Loeff on Hit, a movie chronicling pop artists of Uruguayan music. Abend took home a Best Editing... Read More