Sorry Wyoming, Tarantino’s Using Colorado To Film ‘Hateful Eight’

The economics behind where a movie is filmed are complex, but the shorthand version is that when there are tax incentives or rebate programs that help reduce the studios fiscal burden, one location can certainly have an advantage over candidates. It also helps if you’re Vancouver, but for the upcoming production of Quentin Tarantino’s post-Civil War western, The Hateful Eight, it looks like the state of Colorado has won out.

The state has blessed a $5 million incentive package to help bring production of writer-director Quentin Tarantino’s eighth feature film to southwestern Colorado in December.

The state Economic Development Commission approved the package Friday morning, allowing the state to beat out rival locales Utah and Wyoming for filming.

The film is reportedly set in Wyoming so this is bit of a punch in the pride for The Cowboy State, isn’t it? It’s also the first significant production in Colorado in a long time.

Budgeted at $44 million, Tarantino’s “The Hateful Eight” would be the most significant production undertaken in the state since the 1969 classic “True Grit” was shot here.

“The whole movie’s going to be shot here, exteriors and interiors,” Zuckerman said. “They’re going to build it on a ranch.”

The film’s Colorado budget includes $15.7 million for payroll, including a Colorado crew of 168, and $9.35 million in other in-state spending, including lodging. The state rebate of $5 million represents 20 percent of that spending.

Prep work should begin early next month with shooting expected to start on Dec. 8 at the Schmid Ranch, on Wilson Mesa 10 miles west of Telluride. The crew would be housed in Telluride and take a break over the Christmas holiday.

The nearly 900-acre, high-mesa ranch, homesteaded in 1882, is under a conservation easement, which will require that the land be returned to its original state after filming is completed.

I assume that that means that a member of the crew will sop up all of the fake blood and sweep away all of Michael Madsen’s microwave burrito wrappers before Tarantino and his good time buddies blow out of town in slow motion. But while that may sound like a thankless job, for the lucky Colorado citizen that gets that gig it will surely be a dream come true that validates this $5 million investment by the state. In all seriousness, bringing jobs and tax revenue to Colorado seems like a sound policy decision, especially since one can’t build roads and bridges on pot tax revenue and good intentions alone.

Source: The Denver Post

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