How to Lazy-Load a Python Module Import with Example

To dynamically load or lazy-load a python module, do the following:

import_str = 'from pprint import pprint'
exec(import_str)

A more complete example with error catching.

import pprint

module_name = 'bar'
definition = 'my_method'
import_str = 'from foo.{0} import {1}'.format(module_name, definition)

try:
    exec(import_str)
except ImportError:
    print('import failed:', import_str)
else:
    pprint.pprint(locals())