What lures Bollywood to London?

Bollywood may be going around the world exploring exotic locations, but they still seem to feel incomplete without their favourite location, London!

After the recent flux of films being shot at locations like South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Russia, Bollywood’s gone back to shooting at London.

Actor Shah Rukh Khan has shot a major part of Ra.One in London. Recently a schedule of the film Desi Boyz was completed there with actors Akshay Kumar, John Abraham, Deepika Padukone and Chitrangda Singh.

Kumar is once again shooting in London for filmmaker Sajid Khan’s Housefull 2 with actors Asin, Riteish Deshmukh and Jacqueline Fernandes.

Actor Saif Ali Khan too is in London to shoot his second home production (tentatively titled Cocktail). Priyadarshan’s next film, Tez has also been shot in London.

It is not just films, but premieres of big Indian films have also been held in London, the last being Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan starrer Raavan.
Says trade analyst Amod Mehra, “Shooting in London has its advantages. If you have a local sponsor, you get a huge rebate on the entire amount spent while shooting there. It also helps that the UK government is co-operative when it comes to giving permissions. Shooting in countries like Singapore is tough because the rules are stringent.”

Another veteran film producer reasons, “The maximum Bollywood crazy fans are found in London. It’s like being home. UK is one of the biggest markets for Bollywood films and all producers are aware of that.”

Something that even UK seems to understand because when they launched their global tourism campaign recently, they included Indian origin actor, Dev Patel among the likes of Brit veteran actors Judi Dench and Rupert Everett.