Movie makers choosing Hall Co. for filming more and more

GAINESVILLE - A film crew shooting exterior footage of a home in the north Hall County area this week caused a bit of a traffic headache for some residents along Shirley Road. And, based on the popularity of Hall County for Hollywood film crews, more of those little disturbances are headed in this direction.

Local officials say, though, that the hassles are worth it because of the money the filmmakers are bringing to the area.

Stacey Dickson with the Lake Lanier Convention & Visitors Bureau acts as the county's Camera-Ready Liaison for the Georgia Film Office, and she said Friday that the crew in town most recently was working on the upcoming movie The Accountant. No actors were in the area, but there were others making an economic impact.

"They had crews staying in the area in hotels, they were taking advantage of utility services, they paid location fees to the homeowners that they used their properties, they were buying equipment and fuel and all kinds of things," said Dickson.

Hall County has proved attractive to location scouts, according to Dickson, mainly because of the county's proximity to Atlanta. So, there is opportunity for property owners who might want to rent their homes for upcoming movie projects.

"Getting your property listed is really easy," said Dickson. "The state has a database called Reel Scout...it's a photographic library where we can post images of properties along with some of the basic information like the type of architecture."

Part of Dickson's job is matching up those properties with location managers who come to Georgia looking for the perfect place to film. She even has a team of local location scouts in Hall County that she can call if a filmmaker is searching for a specific type of property. Dickson said it's not always the fancy lake homes that are Hollywood's radar.

"Anyone that has a property that's a commercial property or residential property or it could be a vacant lot or a farm field...sometimes they need an abandoned gas station," said Dickson.

Dickson said one development she would like to see as movie maker continue to flock to Georgia is a film studio in Hall County.

"We'd love to see some studio space here in Hall County...we could house more productions from 'soup to nuts' where they don't have to go back and forth to Atlanta. That would be amazing!"