Written by Kianna Best on Jun 17, 2024. Posted in General Interest

A look into the filming potential of Colombia

Colombia’s rise as a screen industry powerhouse is more evident than ever. The Latin American production hub offers an enticing 40% cash rebate on offer for international producers, and a slate of projects for streamers Netflix and Apple+ as well as this year’s release of Paddington in Peru showcasing the country’s location doubling capabilities. To take in the location potential and production possibilities themselves, a group of UK and US producers and industry executives travelled to Colombia for a FAM trip hosted by Production Service Network (PSN). We got some insight on the trip and the potential of filming in the country.

 

 

Is there potential to get variety from the locations found in Colombia?

Gage Henlon, manager of physical production, Arts Equity:  It's so diverse here. When we were by the racetrack off that interstate, an hour and a half drive out, it's completely different than the city of 11 million people that is Bogotá. Other than the signage, it sort of felt like we were in Appalachia with some of the rolling hills which was a very interesting feeling. There are many looks. That certainly exceeded any expectations.

 

Jackson Reynolds, director of television production, Sony Television:  I felt like we were in upstate New York when we were at the Yacht Club. And now, the location we just saw feels just like Tulum. Even where we had lunch today, kind of felt Florida Keys. A lot of Bogota, some of the city center there, you could easily double for Mexico City. Some of the municipal buildings. I'd be very confident that we could bring a variety shows based in different locations and pull it off.

 

Adrienne Jones, vice president of production, Skydance: Locations are all about where you can double other locations. It was very surprising to me to see that you can potentially double New Orleans in Cartagena. You can also turn the camera and get a Miami cityscape.

 

Ben Rimmer, independent executive producer and producer: I love the streets in Bogota, the sort of atmospheric looking ones. I just didn't realize that favelas could be doubled here. You know, there've been some fantastic chase sequences over the rooftops of favelas in other countries.

 

 

What were some of the most noteworthy locations from your trip?

 

Carolina Christ, LATM production executive, Apple TV+:  I saw fantastic locations that are abandoned. They are super cheap. To start thinking about that sort of location, concentrate a production in a location like that, even from the creation, meaning the writing, for that type of price, would be fantastic. That's how to be more innovative in a world of production.

 

Hend Baghdady, independent producer:  The iron factory was so The Walking Dead. Even if you just shot it as plates to use like there's a lot of richness in architecture here.

 

Rimmer: The salt mine cathedral was extraordinary for the right project. I've never seen that before. That made a great impression. The lake was magnificent with the straw and just that smoke gently coming off. You could be in the middle of a Congo or something quite jungle-like although we weren't near the jungle. It was extraordinary.

 

Michael Robins, independent producer: I think that downtown Bogota as well as the streets and alleyways we saw up on the hill are all interesting. What I've seen of the countryside too. The kind of urban landscape is interesting because you obviously have quite a lot of wealth and a lot of poverty as well so you could do either.

 

 

How will increased studio space in Colombia diversify the kinds of projects coming to shoot in the country and will this development influence your consideration of working in the country?

 

Henlon: We saw everything from, you know, 33-35-foot-high stages, which is what we would be accustomed to, all the way down to smaller white cycs. I was not expecting that either. There's a little bit of something for everybody. To see that we could bring in a big budget picture, or while we're here we could do a commercial as well, is great to know.

 

Reynolds: I want to keep an eye on what's coming here. If this becomes a major hotspot and we're competing against a Netflix or an Amazon, which we absolutely will be because especially you know Sony's kind of on its own because we don't have a platform at the moment, we have to depend on being everyone's second favorite studio after ourselves. So, we have a lot of pressure to find stage facilities, to lock down locations before some larger company like Netflix grabs it up. So, it would be important to know we have that infrastructure to support us going in and enough of it.

 

David Friendly, executive producer and producer, Friendly Films:  We saw a good range of stages. Now, if you're mounting a big movie production or something, I think there's enough stage space here where you can get your work done on a typical kind of show.  You know that you could build certain kinds of sets here, no problem. For your standard kind of show, I think there's plenty of space here. The other thing that really caught me by surprise was the level of technology. That volume stage was state of the art, man. There was stuff in there I had never seen before. That's always exciting. And it tells you that the country is right with it. And they're paying attention to these things.

 

 

With the infrastructural developments taking place, is there a parallel development of crew to solidify the overall growing industry?

 

Friendly:  My sense here is that there's a passion for film. I'm not sure it's the deepest crew base, but why would it be? They need to have more things shot here and then more people come here and work in those jobs, but I think it's kind of like a cool place to get in on the ground floor because it's beautiful and it's just very scenic. Your only fear is that you don't want to get here and be very excited about the incentives and then you know, you wonder is there a deep enough crew base, but I think that's probably growing. The thing is when you're making a show and you're coming to a place like this, you don't want to travel in a whole crew. You're going to bring your DP, you're going to bring your AD, but you want to fill that out with some other people who are local.  And there just may not be that many yet. But there will be. You kind of feel it. That it's going to grow rapidly.

 

Jones:  It's tough because you need a deep pool of extremely seasoned crews with big credits to their name. That's why so many productions go to Canada and Budapest. Right now, Colombia has a large base of crew that have expertise in commercials and local productions and so that's a hard sell to a Network who is looking for an elevated finished product. It is helpful for them to learn and to get the credits by shadowing some of the major foreign studio and network creative HOD’s, for example. There's a feel-good nature to that because we leave behind a trail of people that earn the credit of an international recognized production. With that said, Colombia can't train people up unless the foreign productions come in. The incentive can help. It requires us to participate in a training program. Once they grow that talent base here then it may be worth investing in the development of large-scale sound stages, back lots and tanks.

 

 

Images courtesy of PSN