Malaysia being mentioned in Popular Movies/TV Series

I was just watching Seinfeld the other day when they mentioned that someone had bought a paid of glasses from Malaysia. It was a pleasant surprise to have people mention your country – especially in the 90s when Malaysia was not really on the map. This was in Seinfeld Season 6, Episode 13(The Scofflaw).

Then I remembered Zoolander, with Ben Stiller acting as a male model wanting to kill the Prime Minister of Malaysia. A few times Malaysia was mentioned, but the name twisted to be Micronasia and something else. That I felt, was quite offensive to be honest! I guess the scriptwriters might have thought that ofending 26 million people is ok. Out of there, how many will actually watch the movie? To be fair, Malaysians are huge fans of American movie. However, from the 26m, only half might even think of watching (the rest either being too young or too old). Of that half, half might actually watch it. Of that, half or more would be watching a pirated version – how to complain. Technically only about 3.25 million would actually bother to watch it in the cinema/but the dvd, giving them the right to be outraged by it.

It is good that Malaysia is being mentioned in these shows. However, it is also important that we put ourselves on the map and for that we need an image. A holiday destination is a good start. For instance, Malaysia is often mentioned in  Bollywood and tamil movies as somewhere modern yet exotic. And this definitely helps with the tourism industry. The world needs to know what we are good for something – and these positive attributes in movies will help, especially since the twin towers that put us on the map will fade off when Burj Dubai(highest tower in the world) becomes fully operational and draws all the attention.