British singer Zayn Malik, DJ R3HAB, and artist Jungleboi have shot their latest music video in Kyiv.
Released less than 24 hours ago, the music video already has over 800,000 views on YouTube.
The video with dystopian themes includes images of Kyiv’s Soviet architecture, people dressed in matching white outfits ala a futurist cult walking up the stairs of the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine.
Malik – a British star who first found fame as a member of the boyband One Direction before becoming a solo artist – was the head of the music video’s storyline and concept.
The video follows the dancers dressed in white as they perform a synchronized routine led by a figure in a black hoodie seemingly trying to free them from the system before it opts to set itself on fire instead.
Los Angeles-based filmmakers Ivanna and Frank Borin directed the project. These directors have also worked with famous artists Bon Jovi, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Eminem.
Ukraine is no stranger to successful, foreign artists and companies wanting to film in Kyiv. In December, the British rapper Stormzy released a Kyiv-shot video for the song “Audacity” featuring British rapper Headie One.
That video follows Stormzy beneath Kyiv’s Darnitsky bridge and has reached over 5.5 million views on YouTube. Previously, Stormzy also shot a music video for Jorja Smith’s song “Let me Down” in Ukraine.
The list of artists who have decided to film in Ukraine goes on.
U.S singer Miley Cyrus and British DJ Mark Ronson filmed the video for 2018’s “Nothing Breaks Like a Heart” on the Darnystkyi Bridge, and later that year U.S artist Oliver Tree released his video “Hurt,” getting 29 million views.
Others videos shot in Kyiv include English rock band Foals’ 2018 video “What went down,” filmed in Kyiv’s Troeshyna district, a 2017 Apple Watch commercial filmed in Kyiv’s Railway station and Zoloti Vorota metro station, a 2017 commercial from the Italian brand Diesel and Dior’s “Poison Club” commercial video.
Why Ukraine?
Along with the trend of post-Soviet architecture, the accessibility and ratio of cost to quality are the main reasons so many artists and companies have decided to film in Ukraine.
In a 2017 interview with Kyiv Post, Anastasia Bukovska, executive producer at the Kyiv-based Family Production company that offers production services to foreign artists and companies and helped produce the 2017 Diesel commercial, explained that “it’s not just about how cheap but how impressive locations are.”
She explained how filming locations in Kyiv are accessible, for instance “it’s possible to get permission to film in the metro faster than in other European cities.”
In an interview with Hromadske International, Volodymyr Yatsenko, general producer for Limelight film production house which helped produce the Miley Cyrus and Mark Ronson video, added that “In Ukraine, you can film inside metro stations, in the airport, in the militarized units. It’s not too bureaucratized here, because in Europe it totally is.”
“Prices starts from 30,000 euros and have no limit…but outside of Ukraine, prices start at 50,000 euros, so it’s a least twice as low here as it is in Germany or France.”
