THIS week saw parts of Bendigo dressed as 1940s America as film crews arrived to shoot South Korean film Road to Boston.
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The success of the visit, which included the community welcoming as well as participating in the film shoot, should be encouraging to filmmakers.
Hopefully it means we see more larger scale films and television shows visiting the region.
For years Bendigo was a burgeoning arts scene but in recent times it has firmly established itself as one of Australia's arts and culture capital. That began with the growth of the Bendigo Art Gallery's reputation as it attracted more exclusive exhibitions.
It was followed by the building of Ulumbarra which in its five years of operation has rejuvenated the local theatre while also attracting more high profile arts performers.
Combined with the pride in the preservation of heritage the region has long held, it makes us an attractive prospect for creatively-minded people.
Bendigo music scene is well regarded thanks to the Bendigo Blues and Roots Festival and Grooving the Moo, which attract crowds thousands to their events each year.
The last piece of the region's arts and culture puzzle is film and television.
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Places in the region have sporadically attracted film crews with ABC drama Glitch filming in Castlemaine in 2014, filmmaker Matthew Holmes filming 2016's The Legend of Ben Hall in Macedon and Kyneton and the Road to Boston crew choosing Bendigo for parts of its shoot.
Additionally, we should be eager to show off our city that includes well preserved heritage and has a strong arts and culture scene.
Hosting film crews does come with the potential for streets and parts of the city being shut down for periods of time. This week the Road to Boston filming closed down Pall Mall along with McKenzie and Wattles streets for a day each with motorists detouring through other parts of Bendigo.
But there was a lot of interest in passers by who stopped to watch part of the filing or workers took their lunch break at Conservatory Gardens to get a glimpses of exactly how the set designers and artists changed Bendigo to 1940s Boston.
With a crew coming into town for a number of days it is an extra boost for accommodation and hospitality businesses that make them comfortable. It also gave locals a chance to be in a film as a background artist.
Overall, this week's Road to Boston experience felt like a positive one for both Bendigo and the visiting filmmakers. We should encourage more experiences like it.