KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's natural scenic beauty, such as its lush rainforests and beaches, are a main attraction for foreign film productions to carry out filming here despite the pandemic.
The National Film Development Corporation (Finas) chairman Zakaria Abdul Hamid said that 13 international film projects had applied to shoot in Malaysia since two years ago.
"Many think that every single thing stopped when the pandemic happened. In fact it didn't and Finas had received applications for six international projects in 2020.
"From this amount, one involved filming for a TV programme. However, the foreign production had to withdraw since it couldn't continue with the physical shoot.
"Three others involved post-production work and two animated films. Even though the MCO was enforced, the productions carried on via agents. These involved productions from France, Hong Kong, Singapore, Finland and China," he said in a news report today.
Zakaria added that seven other international projects were made up of a feature film, post-production work and animations from last year.
"One of it involves filming for a feature film that has not started yet. The remaining are one post-production project and five animated films. These are projects from India, the US, UK and Hong Kong.
"So Finas expects that more international productions will be utilising Malaysia as a hub of sorts for filming and movie making," he said.
Zakaria explained that up till now, Finas is still receiving requests and enquiries from foreign productions to film here.
"International production companies have agents in Malaysia that serve as an intermediary. So we have received many requests for forest and beach areas outside of KL to be used as filming locations.
"Most foreign productions do not choose a metropolitan city as a location to shoot in Malaysia," he said.
Finas also offers the Film in Malaysia Incentive (FIMI) programme that aims to spur the entertainment economy and generate income for local practitioners.
"The government has allocated RM300 million for this scheme so that international producers or production companies can receive a 30 per cent rebate on filmmaking costs.
"This scheme will enable more foreign productions to choose Malaysia and in the process help to develop the economy," he said.
