Special Issue Film-induced Tourism

Film tourism is a recent socio-cultural phenomenon: spontaneous and growing, it has captured the attention of the media and of tour operators. It is stimulated and led by a vision of territorial location that affects the viewer's gaze. The decision to film a work of cinema or television in a specific area generates a series of effects on tourism and other economic and social activities. Nevertheless, the effects on a place can be of various kinds, the attention of local actors and scholars is focused on the impact in terms of tourist flows. Numerous studies have shown an increase of tourists in locations where films were successfully shot. It is often daunting, if not impossible, to quantify the impact of film or television in terms of growth of tourist flows, because the variation in the number of admissions is affected by various factors. The relationship between film and television, and tourist flows, however, cannot be limited to a quantitative evaluation, but should focus primarily on the motivational aspect that drives tourists to go to that place. Cinematic space has therefore today become tourist space. In fact, film locations are transformed into new destinations of modern tourism. Which place identities are formed through the big and small screens? How can local actors use the screen as a tool for promoting tourism in a given territory? What are the threats and opportunities that arise from the transformation of a place in a particular location? We are looking especially for projects that take a comparative approach that highlight the potential of film to foster economic and local development, particularly that based upon tourism. Themes and approaches can include but are not limited to public-private partnerships, consumer-visitor experience, and social, economic and cultural aspects. We will favour studies that are place-based and which aim to provide an inclusive and integrated investigation of the territorial aspect of film tourism as it exists at multiple scales