Interview with Hala Matar for her debut film Electra premiering at SBIFF

ELECTRA

With Bahraini - American director: Hala Matar.

The story revolves around a journalist who travels to Rome for an interview with a renowned musician, only to be drawn into an unexpected invitation that sets off a thrilling adventure filled with mystery and surprises.

Maria Bakalova and Abigail Cowen shine so brightly in this travel movie following two women going to interview a famous musician, played by Jack Fathing. The brilliant director, Hala Matar, who had done several successful short, is signing her first feature with ‘Electra’. And we can be sure this won’t be her last. Her talent is solid, and it emerges from this film: a thrilling romantic savor that will put you on an emotional edge.

Let Hala Matar reveal her vision for this film and what it is truly about.

Q: What inspired you to do this film? How did it come together?

Hala: I have to confess I love Italian cinema and I have been highly influenced by Italian movies. It wasn’t easy to come up with my first feature script. It took some time to complete it. The idea came from a location that became available and I decided to create a movie around this location. For my first feature I wanted to make something manageable and easy to film. One main location was ideal for this reason. Also, we all stayed there, and it was a lot of fun.

Q: Since it’s your first movie, tell me about the various challenges you had to face?

Hala: The biggest challenge was the 14 days of shooting. This was quite stressful and surreal. Lots of directors face this time challenge and I did face it for sure. Also, because we shot in Italy, we only had 9 hours shoot day. In America you can go easily to 12 hours shoot day. So, this was quite challenging to get all the shots I needed, each day. Thanks Good I had such a talented team of people and I think I got what I needed at the end.

Q: What is this film truly about for you?

Hala: It’s really about honesty and being truthful in relationships. It’s also about unresolved truth, unresolved business. If it’s unresolved it can torture you, in your mind. It really tortures you until it’s resolved. And of course it’s also about how it can affect other people. One theme is about opened relationship and some people are fine about it. But you truly don’t know how it can affect the other party involved. Finally, it’s also a movie about “standing up for yourself”. Somewhat it’s about women empowerment!

Q: What does come to the Santa Barbara film festival means to you?

Hala: I’m very grateful and honored to be here. I am very curious to see the film with an audience and how they react, especially because this is my first feature. I hope people get interested with my film.