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Galveston In The Movies?


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Jim Carrey is starring a movie that includes scenes about Galveston. Unfortunately, those scenes are being filmed in New Orleans. Why can't Galveston get this opportunity and what area will New Orleans try to duplicate?

I would think COST of production would be a main factor, and also trying to pump some money into the economy there.

I would need to know what the scenes and the movie were about in order to give a better opinion as to what they were trying to convey.

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Where was Full Moon in Blue Water filmed? It was set on the Texas coast and was very convincing. I'm thinking it must have been local-ish, with such local personalities as Marietta Marich, Tiny Skaggs, and Peter Masterson's daughter, my Rice classmate Lexie Masterson, in the cast.

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Where was Full Moon in Blue Water filmed? It was set on the Texas coast and was very convincing. I'm thinking it must have been local-ish, with such local personalities as Marietta Marich, Tiny Skaggs, and Peter Masterson's daughter, my Rice classmate Lexie Masterson, in the cast.

It was shot in Seabrook, Kemah, and Galveston.

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I remember an episode of "Dallas" once where Pam went to a conference of some sort in Port Aransas and when she got there it looked like Miami or San Diego: palm trees, luxury hotel, yachts. It was obvious that the writers/producers/directors/whoever had just pulled out a map and picked a random town on the coast and had no idea what the real Port Aransas looked like.

I suspect that Galveston in a movie would get very similar treatment as there is nowhere on the Texas Coast that anyone could consider reasonably consider "beautiful" in the strictest Hollywood sense.

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  • 1 year later...

Here's the flix shot in Galveston:

Together Brothers (1974) - music score by Galveston native Barry White

Night Game (1989) - with Roy Schieder (Jaws) as a Galveston cop - Balinese Room used as a filming location

Keaton's Cop (made for cable) (1991)

Don't Look Back (1996 HBO film) - filmed on Tiki Island

Night Game was on cable a few years ago. I thought it interesting to see a couple of scenes from the old J.R. McConnell development on East Beach that was never completed. One of my contacts in the building trade at the time said that the amount of lumber used on this particular development actually put a temporary shortage in the market. It all ended up in a landfill somewhere. Just as well, hurricane Ike would have made a real mess of it anyway. Just like it did the Balinese Room.

The premise of the movie was that anytime a certain Astro's pitcher was on the mound, someone in Galveston got murdered. Weird plot!

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  • 2 weeks later...

At least one of Kenny Rogers' "Gambler" movies was partially shot in Galveston. Number 5 I believe. They removed the parking meters along the Strand and covered other modern signs with old style ones, brought in loads and loads of dirt to put on the street and had a trail ride complete with cattle and cowboys on horseback.

Our old car club had a number of early Fords in it as I believe the movie was set in the 1905-10 era. My husband can be seen in the opening credits, driving his car dressed in goggles and duster amid the confusion of the cattle.

There was another movie with Treat Williams that was also filmed in Galveston. Can't remember thename but it too utilized our old cars.

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  • 11 years later...

The reason for filming scenes depicting Galveston TX in New Orleans LA is likely due to the better tax incentives the state of Louisiana offers compared to those the state of Texas offers. This is also the likely reason scenes depicting Galveston TX in the 2018 movie, GALVESTON, were filmed in Tybee Island GA. For accounting purposes, tax incentives are treated as income; the better the tax incentives, the higher the income. Cost of production in Galveston TX is probably comparable to cost of production in New Orleans LA or Tybee Island GA. In summary, when the costs of production are comparable, it makes good economic sense to chose filming locations in states offering the best tax incentives.

The downside of filming scenes depicting places in Texas in other states is the possibility that many Texans expect scenes depicting Texas to be filmed in Texas.  

      

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13 minutes ago, k5jri radio said:

The reason for filming scenes depicting Galveston TX in New Orleans LA is likely due to the better tax incentives the state of Louisiana offers compared to those the state of Texas offers. This is also the likely reason scenes depicting Galveston TX in the 2018 movie, GALVESTON, were filmed in Tybee Island GA. For accounting purposes, tax incentives are treated as income; the better the tax incentives, the higher the income. Cost of production in Galveston TX is probably comparable to cost of production in New Orleans LA or Tybee Island GA. In summary, when the costs of production are comparable, it makes good economic sense to chose filming locations in states offering the best tax incentives.

The downside of filming scenes depicting places in Texas in other states is the possibility that many Texans expect scenes depicting Texas to be filmed in Texas.  

      

That probably explains why the series "Ozark" is filmed in the Atlanta area, and not in the actual Lake of the Ozarks.
Sometimes this can come back to bite the filmmaker. I've heard that at the Houston premier of "Urban Cowboy" the audience burst into laughter, because when John Travolta stepped out of his trailer, the famous mountains of Pasadena TX could be seen in the distance.

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Urban Cowboy grossed nearly $50 million 1980 dollars (approx $165 million in 2021 dollars). With that in mind, the scene depicting southeast Texas with the San Gabriel Mountains visible in the background seems to be a significant error that should have been corrected during post production. There may have been budgetary constraints that limited the amount of time and money that could be spent on post production.

After Urban Cowboy, John Travolta's career declined during the 1980s, but True Lies (1994) returned him to major star status.

By contrast, his costar Debra Winger, became a major star during the 1980s, but her career declined in the 1990s.

 

 

 

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  • The title was changed to Galveston In The Movies?
  • 11 months later...
On 9/22/2021 at 1:49 PM, dbigtex56 said:

Sometimes this can come back to bite the filmmaker. I've heard that at the Houston premier of "Urban Cowboy" the audience burst into laughter, because when John Travolta stepped out of his trailer, the famous mountains of Pasadena TX could be seen in the distance.

There used to be a clip or a few clips of the news coverage of the opening night from Channel 2 out there on one of the non YouTube video sharing sites. Dailymotion or Vimeo - I don't remember which but I haven't been able to find it in some time.

It was fantastic, not necessarily for the event, but for the reports that Dan O'Rourke filed from outside of the theater. From what I recall - he did a straight overview of the event, with some slight commentary about the potential impact of the film on Houston's image and the like.  There was a second piece that he did maybe later that evening or whatever where a version of that piece played recapping the events - then he just basically decided to offer his own "review" of the film essentially stating that it wasn't that great for various reasons and that it didn't really do Houston any favors. As time has gone on, I've found myself in agreement with that assessment as well.

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