The film industry has a stake in the development of a film tourism destination as with the
decision of filming at a particular location, they eventually trigger the interest in this destination
and thereby the potential of this location to be transformed into a destination.
However, “producers think firstly about the right location for the production; they are
not in the business either of making a location look good for its own sake, or of pandering
to the wishes of local tourism officers” (Evans, 2004, p. 6) The first problem arises at the
first stage of the planning process (definition of goals and objectives, identification of the
tourism system including resources, organisations and markets, generation and evaluation
of alternatives, selection and implementation of tourism and finally monitoring and evaluation).
According to effective stakeholder management, the film industry would have to be
involved in every part, including the first step of defining the goals and objectives. This is
less likely, as the film industry has a different agenda: creating the film they want, not the
tourism image that marketing or the community wants (Beeton, 2005). To date, there is
only limited evidence that the film industry has been actively included in the tourism
planning process. The film industry has been less enthusiastic about collaboration;
however, the benefits of partnerships have been recognised in this industry as well,
albeit with a more instrumental approach which suggests that the benefits of film locations
becoming tourism destinations are taken as negotiating points when it comes to favourable
conditions for filming. Evidence from the UK, USA and other countries indicate some
form of collaboration between the film and tourism industries on a larger scale through
government funded schemes that are targeted at promoting the destination for future
film locations (see for example CanagaRetna, 2007; Olsberg/SPI, 2007).