The Chinese buddy comedy Lost in Thailand (trailer above) was partly responsible for a 62-percent rise in Chinese tourism to Thailand. The Economist considers the effects of film-driven tourism:
It is impossible to find numbers – at least reliable numbers not hyped up by a country’s tourist board. But films’ impact can be seen on two levels. The first is macro. Hollywood, for example, is a hugely important aspect of America’s soft power. There is little doubt that many of the tourists who visit New York do so because their imagination has been caught by the screen images of a thousand films. Something similar also seems to be happening in Nigeria, as Nollywood films, which are shown ceaselessly across Africa, are said to be drawing in visitors.
Then there is the micro level: the effect of individual films, as with the Lost in Thailand example. Tourists flocked to Middle Earth (also known as New Zealand) after the success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. International arrivals to the country rose by 40 percent between 2000 and 2006, much of which was attributed to “Tolkien tourism” (by way of a rough comparison, Australian arrivals increased by 13 percent over the same period). Florence apparently expects last year’s film Inferno, based on Dan Brown’s blockbuster, to single-handedly reverse a 10-percent slump in its tourist numbers. Mamma Mia!, if the Daily Mail can be believed, “ruined” Skopelos, the Greek island on which it is set, after the tourists arrived in droves.
The Dish 