MEXICO'S DRUG GANGS DRIVE FILM CREW OUT OF TOWN

Escalating Violence Is Forcing Hollywood And US Tourists To Stay Away.

Mexican drug cartels don't like rivals treading on their territory;
they don't like the police poking around; and now, it seems, they
don't much care for Hollywood taking an interest in their business.

Producers of a film about the murder of a cocaine smuggler, which
would have starred Eva Mendes, Josh Hartnett and Sir Ben Kingsley,
have been forced to abandon filming on the Mexican coast after the
movie-makers received death threats.

Queen of the South, based on a novel by Arturo Perez-Reverte, was due
to be filmed in Sinaloa, on the country's northern coast. But,
following a decision by Jonathan Jakubowicz, its Venezuelan director,
and two of his producers, the plug has now been pulled on the
project. "I've worked really hard to make this beautiful movie, but
the safety of my family and my team comes first," Jakubowicz told
Variety. "Making this movie [would have] put us all at risk, not only
in Mexico but in the US."

The news will heighten fears that Hollywood production, which has
become a growing contributor to the Mexican economy, may disappear
from the country, amid the surge in violence which has killed nearly
7,000 people in the past year. Jakubowicz and his family apparently
received threats while at home in Los Angeles. The shaken film-maker
this week warned colleagues to think twice before attempting to take
on similar projects. "I beg those involved to be responsible and
mindful of the dangerous territory the subject matter inevitably gets
them into," he said.

"We wanted to shoot in the city of Culiacan in Sinaloa, northern
Mexico, the epicentre of the drug wars, but it just wasn't possible.
The world should pray for peace in Mexico."

Many other Hollywood producers, who may be tempted to shoot south of
the border because of lower production costs and tax incentives, are
also now starting to think twice. Security has been a growing problem
since 2005, when Jennifer Lopez and Antonio Banderas's Bordertown was
forced to move production to New Mexico after its crew was followed
and had their hotel rooms ransacked.

Last year, the makers of a Paramount film called El Traspatio (The
Backyard) reported that an actress from Ciudad Juarez, where they
were shooting, had found a slaughtered lamb on her doorstep, with a
death threat pinned to it. She was replaced, for her own safety.
Several other crew members on the film, about local drug murders,
reported receiving sinister anonymous phone calls.

The jumpiness in Hollywood is bad news for the Mexican economy, which
has been hit by the global downturn together with a precipitous
decline in the tourist trade after the US State Department advised
citizens against crossing the border. Free-spending foreign visitors
are virtually absent from resorts such as Tijuana, which would in the
past have been packed with revellers for spring break, when North
American schools are closed for the week.

The escalating security problems, which have seen hundreds of
gruesome public murders, are the result of a government crackdown on
drug cartels which control the cocaine trade into the US, worth
$5.5bn (UKP 4bn) a year.

Although several drug cartel bosses have been arrested, rival groups
are now battling over their former territories. Thousands of police
officers, many with financial ties to cartels, have been killed. Army
units are being brought in to patrol some border areas.

The US government is concerned that if the violence continues to
spread, Mexico could acquire the label of "failed state". Hillary
Clinton, the US Secretary of State, who visited the country last
week, publicly admitted that the security problems were being fuelled
by the failure of the US to stem both the supply of drugs into its
border areas, and the flow of weapons in the opposite direction.