Once the Cape Town Film Studios complex is operational in early 2010 with its 7050m² of stages, it can hope to attract enormous Hollywood productions like the new Batman movie, The Dark Knight, which brought in some $40m to the state of Illinois and created about 4,500 jobs in Chicago.

In a press release the Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich said that Warner Bros spent $17m in wages. More than 300 Illinois vendors including security services, cleaning companies, and caterers pulled in another $22 million.