The National Palace Museum in Taipei recently relaxed its regulations on filming inside the museum, opening its doors to more film crews as the city steps up its efforts to promote local tourism through movies.
The museum has never before agreed to allow commercial filmmakers to shoot scenes inside the museum, because of concerns about the possibility of damage to its priceless collections. The Passage is the first movie to receive permission to shoot scenes inside the museum because the museum is one of the sponsors of the film.
Lee Ming-chin (李明錦), director of the marketing office, said the museum decided to relax its regulations on filming in the hope of introducing its precious collections — from the jade cabbage to stone pork — to more people through the medium of film.
Interested filmmakers can apply to the museum one month prior to shooting. Lee said the museum will still retain strict regulations on lighting of shoots to ensure historical documents stored in the museum are not damaged.
The National Palace Museum is one of the nation’s top attractions. More than 2.5 million local and foreign tourists visited the museum last year, statistics from Taipei City’s Department of Information and Tourism showed.
Taipei Film Commission director Jennifer Jao (饒紫娟) said the museum’s architecture has already attracted many foreign filmmakers to Taiwan. Film crews from India and South Korea shot scenes in the museum’s Zhishan Garden last year with the commission’s assistance.
“We are confident that the museum will attract more filmmakers by granting access to exhibition areas, and movies will help boost the museum’s profile,” she said.
Jao added that Taipei is very supportive of both local and foreign filmmakers that want to shoot scenes in the city, with the commission providing financial and administrative assistance where necessary.
The commission budgeted NT$30 million (US$938,000) this year to sponsor local film crews that shoot scenes in Taipei. It has also been involved in co-production projects with 18 different countries, including the US, Japan, South Korea and India since last year.
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