'The Last Tourist' documentary reveals the dark side of tourism that 'can kill a place'

A newly released documentary, The Last Tourist, shines a light on the dark side of tourism, and the true cost of taking a trip to some of the most popular travel destinations in the world.

“Tourism can kill a place,” the documentary states. “A place that was so beautiful can become overused, exploited and trashed.”

“Mass tourism has led to destruction of the very thing they have come to see.”

Filmmaker Tyson Sadler spent three years travelling to 14 different countries, interviewing travel experts, tour operators and academics to expose the real cost of travel on local communities, the environment and wildlife.

The Last Tourist starts out the documentary with Costas Christ, editor at large at National Geographic Traveler magazine. Christ tells the story about being the first tourist to Ko Pha Ngan in Thailand in 1979, sharing a photo and map, which then spread to more people visiting the location. Years later he saw thousands of people there, destroying the area to have parties.

Where The Last Tourist succeeds is its ability to not oversimplify the message to say, we shouldn’t be travelling, but rather, calls on the tourism industry to involve local communities in local tourism efforts, while also making travellers face the reality of their actions, imploring us to think more critically about how we travel.

Arnie Weissman, editor in chief at Travel Weekly, presents the idea of over tourism, meaning too many people in the same “honeypot destinations” at the same time, which is too much for the landscape, environment and local people to manage.

Dr. Rachel Dodds, professor at Toronto’s 'X' University, states that in addition to travelling to the same places in larger numbers, what we expect when travelling has also shifted throughout time. Specifically now, tourists are looking for that great photo, or selfie, opportunity, with many travellers using their trip abroad as a “status symbol.”

'Tourism can perpetuate poverty by not integrating communities'

Cruise travel is an incredibly popular form of travel, even seeing significant rebound after widespread COVID-19 infections two years ago, and exemplifies that tourism is only beneficial for local communities if they’re actually involved.

Bruce Poon Tip, the founder of G Adventures, indicates that the cruise experience, some even equipped with go-karts on the ship, is more like transferring one Western experience to another location, instead of really immersing yourself in a new destination.

Dr. Martha Honey, executive director of the Center for Responsible Travel, highlighted that the goal of a cruise is to keep as much money flowing back to the ship as possible.

Cruise travellers are told where to shop and spend their money when they get off the boat, often being warned that they “can’t trust the locals” if they steer off the path of the cruise operator.

Similarly, all-inclusive vacations are the same in the way that there is no real integration with the community during the travel experience.

The Last Tourist shares that, for example in Kenya, about 14 per cent of travel revenue stays in the country, with the rest used for things like food that has to be brought in and foreign-owned hotels.

“Tourism can perpetuate poverty by not integrating communities,” Honey says.

'This wallet is a voter…sending a message'

The Last Tourist also addresses the brutal treatment of animals at popular wildlife attractions internationally.

“This wallet is a voter…sending a message, I like this, do more of this,” Jonathan Tourtellot, CEO of the Destination Stewardship Center says in the documentary.

Specifically looking at elephant attractions in Thailand, with people being able to get up close, and on top of, the elephants, Melissa Matlow, campaign director at World Animal Protection gets honest about what that really means.

“Any elephant that’s forced to give tourists rides, or perform circus-like tricks for them, was beaten into submission,” Matlow states, adding that this also leads to post-traumatic stress, seen physically by elephants swaying and pacing back and forth.

Elephants, from the time they are babies, are beaten to be trained to perform, oftentimes with their trunks tied so they don’t kill themselves, Sangduen Lek Chailert, founder of the Save Elephant Foundation reveals.

'Would this happen in your own country?'

Another striking aspect of The Last Tourist is really going behind the curtain of volunteer tourism, one of the fastest growing aspects of the industry that is often largely unregulated.

Clarissa Elakis, project coordinator for ChildSafe International, highlights the problem perfectly. Imagine a bus load of tourists coming into a school, disrupting class to play with a group of children, hold babies, give them candy and expect them to perform. Elakis asks, “would this happen in your own country?”

Through interviews with individuals who participated in these volunteer trips to places like Cambodia (experiences that exemplify a “saviour complex”), they now recognize that the affection they saw was evidence of an attachment disorder, making it harder for these kids to form healthy bonds later in life.

With COVID-19 stalling much of the global travel industry for a period of time, The Last Tourist presents an opportunity for travel lovers to move forward with their trips from a different perspective, tourism based on supporting local people and the local environment.