Hollywood plays the quiet game.

• Position: Western

Publicity is integral in making a movie a hit. But the studio behind the adaptation of a best-selling book that began filming in May in an abandoned mill village near Hildebran is forcing officials to keep quiet. "I'm unaware of a film called The Hunger Games being shot in the village," says an official of the N.C. Film Office, which is under a nondisclosure agreement with Santa Monica, Calif.-based Lions Gate Entertainment Inc. "Do you have another name for it?" (Lionsgate has given the movie the code name Artemis during filming.)

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It's too early to quantify the economic impact shooting had on the area around Hildebran. It's easier to guess at the concessions the film will receive from the state. The movie has a budget of $75 million, according to The Wall Street Journal. Film productions that spend at least $250,000 in North Carolina get a 25% tax credit, capped at $20 million.

Valdese Economic Development Investment Corp., which serves the Hildebran area, hopes the film will be good advertising for the Henry River mill village, a collection of decrepit buildings in the eastern part of Burke County. "What we need is a creative developer to come in and see the town's potential and maybe convert those old buildings into...