TV Times

Sri Lankan locations, which provided settings for number of internationally acclaimed Hollywood movies like 'Bridge on the River Kwai' and 'Indiana Jones' have lured Bollywood filmmakers to make Sri Lanka their next international location centre.

Expressing their interest in making Sri Lanka the next Bollywood locations centre, a team from the Film Federation of India visited Sri Lanka recently.

The delegation headed by the distinguished Bollywood Producer, Boney Kapoor (President) and Sv. Rm. Ramanathan (General Secretary), with a delegates from all parts of India, visited Sri Lanka last week for meetings with the officials of the National Film Corporation and the Minister of Cultural Affairs.

At this meeting Boney Kapoor, the Producer of the hit film "Company" suggested that the Ministry and the Film Corporation of Sri Lanka help to remove some of the bureaucratic red tape and revise the price structure that exists presently between Sinhala and foreign films, so that Bollywood can use Sri Lanka as its next favourite location.

Presently, Switzerland and Mauritius are the leading favourites of the Bollywood filmmakers. Mr. Kapoor has emphasized that there is no reason why Sri Lanka, just a short distance away, with all the beautiful diverse scenery could not be the next Bollywood favourite.

NFC Chairman Asoka Serasinghe speaking to the TV Times about the project stated that the country would benefit in many ways from this project as it would bring a large amount of foreign exchange to the country and experience to the local cast and crew. "According to the agreement the local crews will be able to work with Indian teams and in addition enabling the local cast to make their contribution in their productions. Under the conditions of the agreement at least one role should be awarded to a local star in a film done here," NFC Chairman stated.

Mr. Serasinghe said that the NFC had agreed to bring down the rates charged from foreign filmmakers to 50% in addition to other concessions. "Among the other issues, the NFC also held discussions with the Film Federation of India to obtain assistance to develop two Sri Lankan labs at the Government Film Unit and Sarasaviya studio in Kelaniya." Under the proposed development local studios will be branches of well-known Prasad lab in India providing film developing facilities to films from other South Asian countries in addition to local production.

The NFC chairman also explained that the discussions were held to explore avenues for investment on theatres with latest facilities. "The Indians had expressed their willingness to build theatres here and they would pay for the land and the NFC share," he said.

When asked how long it would take to start filming Indian movies here, Mr. Serasinghe said that the first crew, a South Indian film team was to come on May 18 but it would be delayed due to the prevailing security situation.

Chandran Rutnam, Chairman of Film Location Services well-known location provider for international movies also attended the discussion.