By JIMENITA SWAIN, Guardian Staff Reporter

The Ministry of Tourism is seeking to expand the tourism product by encouraging international film studios executives to view The Bahamas as a possible movie set destination. Two movies, 'After the Sunset' and 'Into the Blue' have been shot in The Bahamas since October last year, supplementing the country's revenue by more than $15 million dollars.

Film Commissioner, Craig Woods spoke to the Nassau Guardian Wednesday and explained what he is hoping to accomplish in the near future.

"We'd like to see the industry grow and develop to the point where we have Bahamians who are working in the industry on a daily basis. The mere fact that we have had two major productions over the past six to eight months speaks positive that production companies are interested in our locations," he said noting, that was not normal.

"If you go to places like Florida, New York or California, they are shooting everyday. We might not have a another shoot like this for another year or so, even though we may be doing everything we possibly can to encourage production companies to come. If they don't require our scenes, water, nice land and seascapes, then they are not going to shoot. We are limited in the scenes we have," he stressed.

As to what the commission is doing to appeal to people in the movie industry, Mr woods said: "First of all, we can't change who we are. We are an island economy. What we do is, we contact the Hollywood Reporter, which is the bible of the industry, to see what's in pre-production, production, what's in preparation and we get the scripts or synopsis, so we can see how the scenes we have in The Bahamas fit the script. They make over 500 movies out of Hollywood a year, if we could get four or five of them a year, it would be a good push to generate revenue for the economy."

He pointed out that many of the scenes in movies today are shot with high speed car chases, aerial shots and some other things. There is no water involved, so whenever they need a big-city-look they are not going to come here. But if they need great water or dive scenes, certainly we feel we dominate in that area and we will do everything possible to encourage them to shoot those scenes here."

Of the two movies, he said more than $15 million dollars has been pumped into the economy. He noted that people shooting "rent hotel rooms, cars, boats, etc." Referring to 'Into the Deep,' he said they rented 30 boats for a set. "They hired extras to be in the movie, they hired communication services, they needed Internet and broad band connection, cell phones, food, beverages, materials to decorate the set, etc. So there is a whole series of supplies and services they use in the country and it is to their advantage," he said, "because they do not want to be bringing those things from the United States."

Moreover, he said, "we are becoming more aggressive by making more calls to studios to pitch our location. We are developing our website, so that it becomes more friendly to film makers, so they can see some locations that are applicable to their story lines. We are attending more trade shows. We are bringing in more directors and location managers to see our country, so they can see exactly what it is, because there is only so much you can show on the Internet or in a brochure," he said.

Indicating that the movie business is a new experience for Bahamians, he explained, "we have not had the ongoing experience of having road closures and some disruption in our lives, because of a movie. We need to encourage our Bahamian community to appreciate the fact that when you do make a movie or any kind or production, you are going to have some disruption. That's a small inconvenience to pay for the amount of money that's going to be dropped into the country."

Despite minor complaints of traffic disruption from the locals on occasion, 6 Woods said "one of the big things we keep hearing from production people is the fact that they feel welcome here. They feel at home."

Additionally, he stated that these people also appreciate the fact that the Bahamian people give them their space and respect their privacy. "They like that. They can walk down the street or walk into a restaurant and they don't have to be beating people off with a stick as oppose to some other places where they just stay in their hotel and eat room service," he said.