Jordan puts in another Hollywood star turn

AMMAN－The lunar landscape of Jordan's Wadi Rum valley gets a starring role this week when the next and final episode of the Star Wars saga opens to global audiences.

The spectacular desert, with its shimmering red sands, majestic dunes and stunning rock formations was also where Peter O'Toole was filmed riding his horse in the 1962 epic Lawrence of Arabia.

From Matt Damon in The Martian to Will Smith in Disney's Aladdin, Jordanian authorities have worked to ensure the country's diverse landscape features in some of Hollywood's biggest blockbusters.

"When you travel to locations everything changes inside of you," Smith told a news conference earlier this year in Jordan's capital Amman.

"When we landed in Jordan all of a sudden you begin to embody the feelings of the characters like when we were in Wadi Rum … it was absolutely spectacular."

Jordan's Royal Film Commission was set up in 2003 to promote the country as a "huge open air studio", says its managing director Mohannad Al-Bakri.

To entice foreign filmmakers, the commission－chaired by Jordanian Prince Ali Bin al Hussein, one of King Abdullah II's half-brothers－offers attractive financial incentives.

Production companies can enjoy a cash rebate ranging from 10 percent to 25 percent if they spend at least $1 million in the country, along with tax exemptions on equipment imported for filming.

But filmmakers also come to Jordan to shoot because they are attracted to the diverse, rich landscape they find in the desert kingdom, according to Bakri.

Over the years dozens of foreign and Arab movies have been filmed in the country, including Hollywood classics such as Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

Indiana Jones, Steven Spielberg's 1989 movie starring Harrison Ford, brought to the big screen the magic of the rose-red archaeological city of Petra, famed for its ornate temples cut into rock.

The stunning and well-preserved sandstone facade of Petra's treasury, Al-Khazneh, which some say dates back to the first century BC, featured as the entrance to a temple housing the Holy Grail in the film.

Parts of this year's Aladdin, Disney's live-action remake, was filmed in Wadi Rum-"the natural choice" for us, director Guy Ritchie told reporters in Amman in May.

Wadi Rum, also known as Valley of the Moon, also served as the backdrop for director David Lean's award-winning Lawrence of Arabia, which some critics have described as perhaps the best, or second-best, film ever made.

Munir Nassar, managing director of Zaman Project Management, a production services company in Jordan, said it took five months to prepare for the filming of the much-anticipated final Star Wars installment.

"When the actors came (to Jordan), filming was completed in 12 days and then they left," Nassar, a former tourism minister, said.

His company was also involved in the filming of four other movies in Jordan, including 2000's Mission to Mars, providing everything from meals to hotel bookings and transport.

"The unique, timeless and diverse landscape of Jordan, along with its highly motivated production crews, makes it an ideal destination for filming," Prince Ali is quoted as saying on the film commission's website.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE