Of Small Towns and Tiny Red Bikinis

Helllllllo, Dahhhlings. Greetings from Southport, or Hollywood East, if you will.

Have you seen it yet? Yes sir, our own little hometowns of Southport and Oak Island star in a very big way in newly released Safe Haven, a movie based on the novel of the same name by Nicholas Sparks, who calls nearby New Bern, North Carolina, home. (Disclosure: I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I will see it this weekend and write a follow-up for next Wednesday).

It doesn’t matter that critics have universally panned the production. Folks here in Southport and Oak Island are packing Southport’sSurf Cinema during continuous matinee and evening performances, blocking traffic up and down major thoroughfare Long Beach Road at each showing. In fact, the critics are being ignored nationwide, it seems. Safe Haven opened in over 3,000 theaters nationwide on Valentine’s Day and took in more than $24.5 million over last weekend. Bruce Willis and A Good Day to Die Hard was number one at the box office with a $29 million take over the weekend and Identity Thief with Mellissa McCarthyand Jason Bateman took second place in box office sweeps with $28 million.

Yeah, Safe Haven is a romantic chick-flick for the most part with the predictable boy-meets-girl and love-ensues theme and only one fairly unpredictable plot twist at the end. I won’t spoil that for you. But as microscopically thin as all that may sound, folks hereabouts know the real stars of Safe Haven aren’t Josh Duhamel and Julianne Hough. We’re not out to catch shots of shirtless Josh or Julianne in her tiny red bikini. We’re out to see the locations – Southport and Oak Island where Safe Haven was filmed last summer.

The movie makers took over the town at the height of the tourist season, recreating Southport’s N.C. Fourth of July Festival Parade and evening fireworks display. In fact, the production company chose not to film the actual parade and fireworks display at our festival. Rather, the parade scenes were shot much later in the summer, as were the fireworks. Fireworks scenes were shot over a period of four nights, lasting from dark to nearly dawn and irritating the restless natives who couldn’t sleep while Hollywood made its magic. CityAldermen are still wrestling with opposing calls to tighten regulations on movie companies or to just leave movie makers alone to spend their money here.

Oak Island is the backdrop for making out and frolicking in the surf scenes where some of the best red bikini shots were taken.

Southport’s history as a movie venue dates back to 1986 whenCrimes of the Heart, featuring Diane Keaton, Sissy Spacek and Jessica Lange was filmed in town. Since that time, numerous movies of lesser note – I KnowWhat You Did Last Summer, Domestic Disturbance, The Butcher’s Wife – were all filmed in and around Southport and Oak Island. My favorite, Weekend at Bernie’s, was filmed across the river at Bald Head Island.

For the most part, the movie makers haven’t posed much of an inconvenience to the locals. Like everything else in this small town, we tend to take it all in stride. It’s fun to see our hometowns on the Silver Screen and it’s fun to see our neighbors playing extras. Whatever our city does, I hope the door will always be open to the movie production companies. The fun they provide and the money they spend in town is well worth the small inconveniences of fame.

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