Fox Studios opens movie theme park in Mexico

ROSARITO, Mexico
(May 19, 2001 09:05 a.m. EDT ) - The studio built to make the Oscar-winning blockbuster "Titanic" opens its doors as a theme park Sunday, offering backlot tours and a look at behind-the-scenes moviemaking.

Mexico has long been used for location filming and its Pacific Coast resorts have strong connections to Hollywood, but the development of Foxplorations marks a major step in capitalizing on that link.

It also represents an expansion of tourism goals for the Baja California peninsula, which has historically lured surfers, fishermen, spring breakers, shoppers and retirees.

"We wanted to open up the doors to the studio to show people this is how movies are made," said Rolando Navarro, a "Titanic" extra who is now operations manager of the park.

Foxplorations, about 25 miles south of the U.S.-Mexican border, is an interactive museum devoted to the craft of film and to the making of the most successful movie of all time.

Visitors can tour movie sets used in major scenes of "Titanic," see how director James Cameron achieved special effects, and get the obsessive insider's view of the massive project from guides who worked as extras on the film.

Foxploration also includes general displays on set design, makeup, animation, camera operations and memorabilia from other 20th Century Fox productions, from "Anna and the King" to "X-Men."

Fox Studios Baja, which remains an active movie production facility on most of its 40-acre site, opened the museum as a way to promote its operations, offset expenses and be more accessible to tourist and residents of Rosarito, said Charles Arneson, the general manager of the studio.

But Arneson said Foxploration also may develop as a tourist destination in its own right in a region that has few attractions other than its scenic coast and inland desert.

"It's one more step in the right direction toward providing family recreation in Baja," he said.

Fox Studios Baja opened in 1996 for "Titanic." Massive water tanks built at the shoreline have since been used in other productions that require ocean scenes, including the James Bond film "Tomorrow Never Dies" and the soon-to-be-released Disney movie "Pearl Harbor."

The studio has no immediate plans to convert the museum into a more traditional theme park with rides, but Baja California Tourism Secretary Juan Tintos is encouraging them to do so.

"We'd like to think of this as the first phase," Tintos said. "For the second phase ... Think of something of the scale of Universal Studios or Disneyland."

Baja California draws about 28 million U.S. visitors a year, most of whom never venture farther than the border city of Tijuana. Tourism revenue totals $1.2 billion, making it the state's second-largest source of income, after the export-manufacturing plants known as maquiladoras.

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