Hawaii is no stranger to movie screens. This Friday (4/18), Hawaii has another starring location role, this time in a new film called Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

Most of the movie’s scenes were filmed on Oahu’s North Shore, including places such as Turtle Bay Resort. Actor Jason Segel (who plays Peter Bretter, the film’s main character) even wrote the script in Hawaii.

In this romantic disaster comedy, Segel’s character, Peter, takes a trip to Hawaii in an attempt to heal his broken heart. But he discovers that his ex, Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell), is staying at the same resort with her new boyfriend.

It’s no surprise why many filmmakers set movies in Hawaii. The tropical sunny weather is appealing, just as much as Hawaii’s palm trees and beaches. According to the Hawaii Film Office, the Islands hosted hundreds of feature films since 1913, including Jurassic Park, Pearl Harbor, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Waterworld, Blue Hawaii, From Here to Eternity and Godzilla.

We posted our favorite five "made-in-Hawaii" movies here, in January.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall is produced by Judd Apatow (Superbad, The 40-Year-Old Virgin), and features stars such as Mila Kunis (“That ‘70s Show”), Paul Rudd (Knocked Up, Clueless) and Jonah Hill (Superbad, Evan Almighty). Even a few Hawaii residents landed acting roles, including Hawaii surfer Kalani Robb.

As with any movie, there’s always mixed reviews. Here’s a sample of what critics had to say: Rotten Tomatoes, The Village Voice, The Movie Blog and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC).

 

You ask. We answer. Again.

Our story in the March/April issue on the 50th anniversary of James Michener’s "Hawaii" prompted an e-mail from reader Carole Anderson in Madison, Wis.

Anderson enjoyed both the book and the 1966 movie version, but was puzzled when we said the flick was Bette Midler’s film debut.

Anderson couldn’t find Midler either in the film or credits.

Raised in Honolulu, Midler was just 20 when she was cast as an extra during the film’s 1965 shoot on Oahu and Kauai. Midler’s blink-and-you'll-miss-it uncredited role was as a seasick passenger on the brig Thetis.

Her “Hawaii” savings in hand, Midler soon left the University of Hawaii-Manoa and moved to New York in 1965 to begin a stage career.

Check out our Michener article. It's well worth a read.
  

While your mind is on romance today, here’s a suggestion.

Tickets for the Hawaii Romance Festival go on sale today. For 10 days in May, the second annual music fest will give attendees more romance for their buck than a Nat King Cole ballads CD on repeat.

The Honolulu-based festival will run from May 2 through 11.

There’ll be concerts full of music’s greatest love songs interpreted live by the likes of Smokey Robinson, Gladys Knight, Aaron Neville, Boz Scaggs, Sergio Mendes and Hawaii vocalists Amy Hanaialii Gilliom and Jimmy Borges.

(The line-up’s old school, yes. But the combo of love and vocalists like Smokey Robinson never goes out of fashion.)

Dinners, dancing and love flicks will be served up at the legendary Royal Hawaiian Hotel, under the stars at the Waikiki Shell and other venues around Honolulu.

Providing the soundtrack for all of the above? Romance Festival co-founder Matt Catingub (pictured) and his own Matt Catingub Orchestra.

If you’re in Honolulu, in May, and in love, it’s a sweetheart of a plan.

Tickets for Hawaii Romance Festival events and fest information may be found here.

  

Got a sweet film you want to direct? Shoot it on Kauai!

Along with rustic Bozeman, MT, Kauai was singled out by MovieMaker Magazine as a “city on the rise” for filmmaking.

The honor was part of the magazine’s annual list of the best 10 places in the United States to “live, work and make movies.”

Kauai didn’t make MovieMaker’s Top 10. Or even its honorable mention list, for that matter. But it’s still in good company.

Factors affecting MovieMaker’s city choices included: financial incentives for filmmakers, a solid talent pool, production facilities, educational opportunities, film offices and film festivals. (I find it interesting that a good deal of the above stuff is actually on Oahu, but, oh well.)

Hollywood (more specifically, Los Angeles) didn’t make any of the magazine’s lists.

You’ll find MovieMaker’s list here. Meanwhile, I’m taking the first flight I can get to Bozeman to scope out the competition.

Notable flicks filmed on Kauai:

• “Six Days, Seven Nights” (1998)
• “Mighty Joe Young” (1998)
• “Jurassic Park” (1993), “The Lost World” (1997), “Jurassic Park III” (2001)
• “Hook” (1991)
• “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (1981)
• “Hawaii” (1966)
• “Blue Hawaii” (1961)
• “South Pacific” (1958)
 

 

Indiana Jones doesn’t just rescue lost Biblical relics. He also took some time last year to rescue Hawaii’s film industry.

The Hawaii Film Office announced today that film producers collectively spent more than $200 million here in 2007—more than in any previous year. The year that came closest to last year’s record take was 2004, with $164 million.

Harrison Ford and the production crew for the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull spent more than $15 million while filming on the Big Island last summer.

Other productions filming in Hawaii last year included the Ben Stiller and Jack Black flick Tropic Thunder (Kauai), Knocked Up director Judd Apatow’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall (Oahu) and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (Maui/Molokai).

About to begin its fourth season on Jan. 31, the hit ABC television series Lost continues to film exclusively on Oahu.

The news left me in the mood to revisit a handful of my all-time-favorite filmed-in-Hawaii flicks. Here are five — one for every pau hana evening of the workweek.

Enjoy. Tell me what I missed. Give me your Top 5. Perhaps I’ll do a second list sometime.

MONDAY
From Here To Eternity (1953). I love that I work just a half-hour’s drive away from the beach where Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr famously rolled in the surf and turf. You know, just in case.

TUESDAY
Blue Hawaii (1961). The best of the three Elvis Presley flicks filmed here has The King singing Ke Kali Nei Au (The Hawaiian Wedding Song) AND Rock-A-Hula Baby.

WEDNESDAY
Donovan’s Reef (1963). John Wayne in Hawaii as tough World War II veteran Michael “Guns” Donovan? Who cares if they called the fictional island Haleakalowa?

THURSDAY
Jurassic Park (1992). Because I still get a kick out of watching Tyrannosaurus Rex chase a herd of Gallimus dinosaurs and a bunch of pesky humans against the backdrop of the Koolau mountain range.

FRIDAY
Punch-Drunk Love (2001). The Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Waikiki has never looked so gorgeous, elegantly old-fashioned and other-worldly all at the same time as in this eccentric romantic comedy.