When Hollywood comes to town: cash pours into regional Australia

Walhalla, a 35 person hamlet in Victoria's Gippsland region, transformed into a mountainside Nepalese village while The Ice Road 2: Road to the Sky, starring Neeson, was filming in January.

Lance Malone, a man from the nearby town of Morwell, visited to the set three time in a week with his camera and peeked over a brick wall dividing the public from the cast and crew.

"It's amazing, it's just surreal. You don't get that here, he's a Hollywood legend," Mr Malone said.

The Ice Road sequel is not the only big-budget film shooting on location in Australia and injecting money into regional economies.

Julia Robert and George Clooney filmed the 2022 romcom Ticket to Paradise in the Whitsundays and George Miller's fifth Mad Max installment Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga was filmed in Hay, NSW.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes was filmed in locations across the Illawarra region and Sydney.

Regional Australia and its "diversity of locations" were attractive to international productions, AusFilm CEO Kate Marks said.

"We have a really strong history and reputation of attracting productions predominantly from the US but other parts of the world as well," she said.

A number of incentives attract big-budget productions. The Ice Road sequel received the Federal Government's Location Incentive and the Victorian Government's Victorian Screen Incentive and Regional Location Assistance Fund.

International productions spent more than $1.2 billion in Australia during the 2022 to 2023 financial year, Ms Marks said.

"Even when a production bases itself in a city, the spread of the expenditure is felt right across the country," she said.

Productions were often based in a major city, using sound stages and visual effects studios, but included trips to film in regional Australian landscapes.

"There's stories about local cafes and the impact when you've got 100 people coming in and getting their coffees every day for five or so weeks," Ms Marks said.

"Or the local hardware stores providing timber and equipment for the sets," she said.

"I think communities have been so wonderful embracing productions and it just being a good experience all around."

Mr Malone is not the only Gippsland man excited to have a star in their midst. He said around 50 people would join him behind the brick wall each day trying to catch a glimpse of the Taken star.

Baw Baw Shire mayor Annemarie McCabe said the historic gold-mining town was "thrilled" to host The Ice Road sequel.

"This is a truly unique opportunity and since the filming announcement we've seen a huge amount of interest in Walhalla and surrounds from right across the country," she said.

"With approximately 90 crew members and [more than 30] cast and extras heading to town, the blockbuster film will provide businesses in Walhalla and surrounding towns like Erica and Rawson with a welcome economic boost to start the year," she said.

Australian actors also saw the benefits. Bernard Curry, from Wentworth and Savage River, Geoff Morrell, from Lord of the Rings and Rake, as well as Grace O'Sullivan from Neighbours were cast in The Ice Road 2.