Indian filmmakers scout locations in southern France

Five representatives from the Indian film industry are currently on a five-day tour of the Occitanie region in southern France to explore possibilities for shooting movies.

The visiting Indian group includes Aashish Singh, Vice President - Production, Yash Raj Films, Kassim Jagmagia, Creative Head - Excel Entertainment, Kanchan Marathe, Director (Creative and Production) - Viacom 18 Media Pvt ltd, Nishanthan Niruthan, General Manager - lyca Productions, and Kulmeet Makkar, CEO - Film and Television Producers Guild of India.

The trip, which began on April 17, is taking them to must-see places of the region, which draws 30 million tourists annually.

The initiative, organised by the French Embassy in India in collaboration with Film France and languedoc Roussillon Cinema, aims to promote France's diverse and picturesque regions, aside from Paris, as filming destinations for Indian movies.

France offers a variety of landscapes -- from mountains - like the French Alps - and extinct volcanoes set in beautiful, rugged landscapes to idyllic coastal locations, such as the Riviera.

The itinerary includes Occitanie's eight Unesco World Heritage sites, besides the region's heritage areas and diverse natural settings: the fairy-tale medieval city of Carcassonne, the colossal Roman aqueduct of Pont du Gard, close to the Roman town of Nîmes; the Canal du Midi waterway - a masterpiece of engineering; the Cirque de Gavarnie, a natural bowl-like rock formation in the Pyrenees mountains.

The producers will also meet professionals from the region and from Film France, the agency in charge of facilitating filming in France. 

France is largely a film-friendly country with state-of-the-art facilities, including studios, digital labs and VFX houses that have worked on major productions around the world.

It also offers a range of affordable filming locations as well as incentives in the form of tax rebates, in particular a tax rebate scheme for foreign productions.