The Institute for Tourism, Travel and Culture at the University of Malta has developed a mobile app enabling tourists to access UNESCO World Heritage Sites that feature in films, TV and online series in an effort to rethink tourism amid the COVID-19 crisis. 

Launched just before the outbreak of coronavirus and updated since, the app leads visitors through six behind-the-scenes routes through UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Europe and the Mediterranean that have helped set films and series in historical contexts as well as supporting film festivals. 

Valletta, Tarragona, Lyon, Genoa and the Peloponnese are discovered through the Movie Travel app through an interactive experience that brings users closer to the audio-visual, artistic and cultural heritage of these places. It enables film and series lovers to discover the UNESCO destinations featured through screenings, panels and cinema-related events.

At its launch in February, Tourism Minister Julia Farrugia Portelli emphasised the value of this tool in an international context which keeps challenging the tourism industry to seek innovation. The director of the Institute for Tourism, Travel and Culture Marie Avellino highlighted the functionality and ease of the app while stressing its timeliness in the way it encourages stakeholders to restructure tourism and travel in novel ways.

She noted how the Institute for Tourism, Travel and Culture is committed to research long-term and sustainable solutions to the current stiff economic climate which is bound to require far-reaching approaches to reviving tourism and travel.

The Movie Travel app was developed by the University of Malta together with its partners in the EU-funded COSME project FAMOUS and is available online. The local partners are Heritage Malta, Spazju Kreattiv, the Malta Film Commission and the Valletta Film Festival.

The website for the project is http://www.movietravel.eu/.