USVI-On-Line

Jim, E-0, have not seen Four Seasons, but may have to watch it now just for Gibney glimpse. And in thinking about it, if I was a location scout, I'd love Gibney. You could basically own the beach. Cut off foot traffic at the gate, plenty of space for trailers, equip and Kraft Services next to the yellow house, and you could rent the Gibney house and put everyone else over at Caneel. It's ideal.

Plus, it wouldn't be too hard to find some willing people to be Extras

Also, in doing some digging, I read where that last scene in Shawshank Redemption (greatest movie ever!) on the beach was also shot either on STT or STJ. It kind of looks like Cinnamon. Trying to find out for sure. That's right, Zihuatanejo is actually USVI. How cool is that?

Then again, Weekend at Bernie's II was also shot on STJ, so shooting on the Rock doesn't exactly guarantee box office gold

Quite a few movies and film shot here - this is not a comprehensive list but would take a while to watch them all anyway.

http://www.imdb.com/search/title?ending ... %20Islands

http://www.filminamerica.com/Islands/VI/

Back in November 2009, we were enjoying a quiet lazy morning on Gibney - only ones on the beach. About 11:00, a couple of guys with headsets on, show up and ask us to move to the other end of the beach. Explained that in a few short hours, the beach would be filled with about 50 - 100 people and IF we were lucky, we could get a glimpse of the "Real Housewives" and watch them film. We explained that we had no idea who the real housewives were and had no intention of moving - we were up early to snag the best spot. BF opened the cooler, cracked a cold one, and laid back in his chair - ready for a stand off.

The more people that showed up, the more annoying it got, and I insisted that we leave because I wasn't going to waste any precious STJ time sharing the beach with all the commotion. He was kind of bummed because he was ready to be on reality TV.

To Gigi's point and bringing this conversation full circle back to E-0's post about the debate regarding the use of recreational space at Gibney, it seems very hypocritical to allow film crews (that are most certainly for profit) to use Gibney while telling bands and other local for profits that they can't.

And Gigi, I wished I'd added in my response above that seeing Gibney in a movie is all well an good UNLESS it was filmed the week I was there. I'm sure that was not cool. I've never seen and episode of Real Housewives, but from what I've heard, they don't draw viewers by being polite or playing nice with one another - which wouldn't be conducive on Gibney or any STJ beach for that matter.

And follow up...I found out the beach featured at the end of Shawshank is one called Sandy Point on St. Croix. I thought it might have been Cinnamon.

The film crews were/are in all cases based on the Gibney family property, not the deed- restricted Oppenheimer lot. At the time The Four Seasons was filmed, there wasn't yet public access through Oppenheimer.

hugo wrote:The film crews were/are in all cases based on the Gibney family property, not the deed- restricted Oppenheimer lot. At the time The Four Seasons was filmed, there wasn't yet public access through Oppenheimer.

My understanding from the links above was that the surviving Gibney family members are opposed to "for-profits" being able to use the deed-restricted Oppenheimer lot next to their property and that makes sense. I would be too if I were them. But it does hurt their case IMO if they themselves are allowing for profit film crews to come use their land.

Their land, their business, but the beach is owned by all. And if the beach wasn't there, then the for profits wouldn't want to rent out the deed-restricted area nor would the film crews want to rent out the Gibney property. Just seems hypocritical to preach maintaining a tranquil setting next door while inviting the circus into your own front yard.

That said, I'll be the first to say that I have a very limited perspective. So this is an observation more so than a judgment.

I think people may be transposing attitudes and conditions the were prevalent in the 70's. 80's and maybe up to 1992 when the Columbus movie used quite a bit of Hawksnest as an anchorage for a shoot --and most of the '1492' movie was filmed on STT in Santa Maria Bay.
Times have changed and the visitor demographic and overall STJ experience are quite different than 20-40 years ago. The current -2014- discussion on the beach usage has very little, if any, real relevance to a few days of filming that took place before most of the current forumites ever even heard of STJ.