Volume 1, No. 9. June 1, 2001
Days of elation
The film clip lasts only two minutes, but it left a lasting impression on the
judges of the U.S. International Film and Video Festival who gave "Genesis"
by International Tourist Attractions (ITA) a Gold Camera Award, which will be
presented at the 34th annual festival in Chicago on June 8. "Genesis," a depiction
of the world's creation that opens ITA's Amazing World attraction in
Eilat, Israel, was one of 1,500 films and video clips submitted from 33 countries
for the festival's competition.
For Tel Aviv-based ITA, the honors come amid the company's rapid expansion in
product placement. Most notable are ITA's Time Elevator 4D theaters,
combining film, motion platforms, and special effects to take guests on a time
machine ride through the ages. The first opened in Jerusalem in 1998, and the
company installed one for Walt Disney World's millennium celebration at Epcot
Center in Orlando.
This month ITA is scheduled to open its second permanent Time Elevator
installation, landing in Rome. Others are scheduled for Limassol, Cyprus, next
winter, Philadelphia next summer, Athens, Pompeii, York (England), Baltimore,
and Atlantic City. The latter two will be housed in complexes that also include
ITA's other products, Amazing World and Oceanarium, and the Philadelphia
project will be part of a five-story library and educational resource center,
ITA's Marketing Coordinator Sharon Lanis said.
Education is a key element to the choice of sites for Time Elevator,
which ITA establishes with local partners. Using leading historians to help
with the scripts, each film is customized to that location. Thus, rich local
history is a necessity—a reason to travel through time. Why Atlantic City?
"It's a developing market," Lanis said. Also, the elevator there not only will
take travelers through the strange but nevertheless rich history of the Jersey
coastal resort but also America in general.
©2001, Minton Enterprises LLC
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