Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Andrew Sanford | News | July 30, 2025
Location scouting is an important part of film and television production. You want to make sure you’re shooting in a location that fits the director’s vision for the material. You also want to see what can be beneficial for everyone involved. It can’t just be about your production. A movie or show can help inject money into a town or city’s economy. One successful production can open doors for more in the future. It’s a big deal and should not be taken lightly.
That doesn’t mean it hasn’t. Most productions try to leave the places they film in a similar or better position than when they arrive. However, plenty of shows and movies have had negative effects on the places they choose to set up their cameras. They can cause traffic jams, noise pollution, and other quality-of-life issues. That’s just a standard production. There can be much larger problems with a bigger budget project, especially if said project is (allegedly) helping to continue the repression of a body of people.
Christopher Nolan’s new take on The Odyssey, starring Matt Damon, has been filming in the Morocco-occupied Western Sahara. Specifically, they spent several days filming in the city of Dakhla this month. That city has been recognized by the U.N. as a “non‑self‑governing territory” since 1963. It is not legally a part of Morocco, but the U.S. and the U.K. have supported Morocco’s claim over the city, and it has been used as a filming location often. Now, the Western Sahara International Film Festival (FiSahara for short) is calling on Nolan to stop filming in the region.
“Dakhla is not just a beautiful location with cinematic sand dunes. Primarily, it is an occupied, militarised city whose indigenous Sahrawi population is subject to brutal repression by occupying Moroccan forces,” FiSahara said in a statement. “By filming part of The Odyssey in an occupied territory billed as a ‘news black hole’ by Reporters Without Borders, Nolan and his team, perhaps unknowingly and unwillingly, are contributing to the repression of the Sahrawi people by Morocco.”
You can read the festival’s whole statement below. It lays out accusations of Morocco attempting to erase Dakhla’s cultural identity and replace it with its own. They claim that, if Nolan knew the scope of what was happening, he would be “horrified.” The plea is heartfelt and is not the first time they have raised the alarm. This time, their message was shared by Javier Bardem, who has supported the region in the past, as has Penelope Cruz. Will Christopher Nolan join their list of supporters and cease filming there? I doubt it, but I’d love to be surprised.
