Security worries cloud Star Wars returning to place where it all began

The sandy south Tunisian province whose stark landscape provided a backdrop for several Star Wars movies would embrace any returning Jedi knight.

"I was working non-stop, it was great," says local resident Tayeb Jallouli of his experience as a senior set technician on episodes of the franchise filmed in the region of Tataouine - which lent its name to Tatooine, the home planet of Jedi knight Luke Skywalker. In contrast, "the situation is tough now and I've had to take jobs as a home decorator to feed my family", he says.

From The English Patient to Raiders of the Lost Ark, the list of foreign films shot in Tunisia reads like a short guide to 20th-century cinema history. But after Tunisia's rebellion ignited the 2011 Arab Spring revolts, political instability and al-Qaeda-linked violence cut overseas productions to about five a year from about 40 previously.

Following the assassinations of two secular opposition leaders this year - attacks blamed on religious hardliners - mass protests toppled Tunisia's government and paralysed its successor. The country has also been hit by spillover from its neighbours, with mountain-based Algerian-linked Islamist militants fighting Tunisian troops. In Libya, the government is too weak to block arms merchants shipping weapons out of the country.

Filmmakers may have been deterred from returning to Tataouine by the location - it's the only Tunisian region to border both Algeria and Libya. "The south was experiencing an economic boom," says Ridha Turki, president of the National Chamber for Tunisian Film Producers. "Now it's a zone of parallel trade and transit for weapons and terrorism. Disorder is an ogre that is scaring away foreign producers and investors," he says.

This idea is backed by Faisal Rokh, a culture ministry spokesman who says: "We've lost the confidence of foreign producers."

The cumulative effect of all this has been profound for Tataouine. The loss of film, television and documentary earnings is only about 60 million dinars (US$36 million), according to Turki, with the drop in tourism and foreign direct investment being larger. But as movie work and tourism dried up in the region, unemployment soared to an estimated 52 per cent, about three times the national average.