UAE tourism bosses should capitalise on the country’s use as a film location to help diversify their tourist product and meet their visitor targets, a travel insider says.
Star Wars VII, Brad Pitt’s War Machine and Jackie Chan’s Kung Fu Yoga have all been shot in the UAE this year, joining other successes such as the Tom Cruise vehicle Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol (MI4), Fast and Furious 7, and Syriana, which starred George Clooney, as well as a slew of Bollywood productions.
“A film's setting makes an emotional connection with the viewer, who often seek out the destination for a more intimate, first hand experience by visiting for themselves,” says Mamoun Hmedan, Managing Director of Wego, a regional travel search site. “It can create a story around a location that they may not have been aware of previously, whether fictional or historical, and peek their interest in a destination they have not considered before.”
Emotional capital
Now UAE tourist bodies should use that emotional capital to pull in more visitors, Hmedan believes. “Film-induced tourism is increasingly acknowledged as a powerful method of attracting visitors as a destination brand marketing tool. There's a great synergy between tourism and film locations.
“This unique impression doesn’t just raise awareness of a city, hotel or street, but actually help people to view them in a different light. We may be aware that the Burj Khalifa is the tallest skyscraper in the world, but it holds an entirely new fascination after watching Tom Cruise scale its exterior,” he says.
Dubai wants to attract 20 million tourists a year by 2020, up from about 14 million tourists annually this year. Abu Dhabi’s Tourism and Culture Authority has set itself a target of 3.9 visitors for this year.
Countries that have successfully harvested travel dollars from film shoots include Switzerland, Malaysia, Jordan, Germany and New Zealand.
Bond and Bollywood
Switzerland’s peaks find favour both with Bond fans – but also with Bollywood, whose directors have shot there for decades. Lake Lauenen near Gstaad, for example, is also called Lake Chopra after the filmmaker Yash Chopra, because so many of his movies were shot there. Visitors to the alpine nation can go on a tailormade tour called the YRF Enchanting Journey, which covers places from Chopra’s Yash Raj Films, or grab a selfie with cutouts of the actors Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol at Mount Titlis, which was seen in the 1995 film Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, one of Bollywood’s most famous.
Elsewhere, New Zealand has been cited for the effects of the Lord of the Rings series. Tolkien tourism, as it’s called, was reportedly responsible for a rise of 40 per cent in tourist numbers – from 1.7 million in 2000 to 2.4 million in 2006. “New Zealand has possibly used the value of destination marketing through film tourism best with the Lord of the Rings series,” Hmedan says.
Not only did tourism rise following the series' release, areas of New Zealand in which the movie was filmed have were inundated with fans seeking out the Lord of the Rings experience, he says. “Parts of the Hobbiton film sets were left in place near Matamata in the country's north island and a number of tours and accommodation businesses have arisen due entirely to the film. Helicopter tours over the snow covered mountains in Queenstown (also featured in the film) in the country's south, are also extremely popular,” he adds, pointing out how the the country went even further by incorporating campaigns with in-flight safety videos featuring characters from the epic movies, as well as designing consistent brand marketing activity in line with each film's release.
Another example is Petra in Jordan, which was a little-known treasure until the Indiana Jones film franchise included it in one of their scenes. Leonardo DiCaprio's film The Beach was filmed in the province of Krabi, Thailand, which also saw visits to the remote Koh Phi Phi islands skyrocket in recent years, and Visit Britain has once again cashed in on the appeal of box-office hero James Bond to market far-flung destinations in the country.
Last year, Tourism Competitive Intelligence, a research agency, estimated that some 45 million international tourists each year chose a destination because they’d seen it in a film or TV show.
Government subsidies
The wave of films being shot in the UAE is a nod to this appeal, says Hmedan. “Abu Dhabi is currently leading the way in MENA by also offering government subsidies for cast and crew, which goes as far on occasion as free flights and accommodation, in an effort to attract more film-makers to the region,” he says.
“We’re showing the world what we’re capable of here in the UAE. The UAE delivers world class facilities and diverse filming locations, but also we’re growing a new respect for our own film-makers and crews, as is evident from the Dubai International Film Festival,” Hmedan continues.
Film tours
However, one tourism opportunity remains to be exploited. Besides the desert safaris and the view from the world’s tallest tower, the list of touristy things to do in the UAE doesn’t yet include tours for film fans – although the Burj Khalifa does offer fans the opportunity for a Tom Cruise-style MI4 photo.
Hmedan isn’t aware of any larger tourism products, he says. “But it wouldn't surprise me if more businesses arise in the wake of more film productions as has occurred in many other destinations around the world.”
For now, we’ll just have to be content with watching the UAE on screen. Coming soon to a cinema near you: Dishoom, directed by Rohit Dhawan. The largest Bollywood production undertaken in Abu Dhabi, with a crew of almost 100, began filming last month.
