Frank Ocean will direct his first movie alongside A24

Although Frank Ocean fans have been waiting for a new album for a very long time now, it looks like Ocean is determined about focusing his creative energy in other directions.

In a 2019 interview, Ocean had claimed that music was a tool for him at first: “It was a driver to get out of the neighbourhood. I remember feeling no attachment to music necessarily, more an attachment to what music could bring if I succeeded, you know, financially. And that meant freedom from my situation at the time, and maybe what I was projecting onto my own future.”

He also spoke about venturing into uncharted territory by working on collaborative projects instead of embracing the loneliness of songwriting: “I think for a while I’d like to get away from work that’s solitary by nature… I’ve been trying to make time to do more of that sort of thing, and be in spaces where I’m not the expert.”

It looks like Ocean has found the perfect collaborative outlet since multiple sources have reported that the music icon is actually planning on making his directorial debut feature. Ocean is a bonafide cinephile, having cited the likes of Luis Buñuel, Wong Kar-wai, Quentin Tarantino, David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick as primary sources of inspiration.

Ocean’s knowledge of world cinema and film history is pretty impressive which is why filmmaking seems like a natural jump for him. He has worked on visual albums before but this would mark the first proper filmmaking effort by the musician. No details have been released yet but this upcoming film is being referred to as Philly.