In a Bangkok hostel he meets a hippie drug addict who talks of a secret, remote paradise beach on an island populated by a small, idealistic group. The hippie kills himself, leaving Richard a crude map of the beach. Once there, they learn the island's terrible secret and the reason for the group's determination to keep outsiders away. But the film-makers decreed that the beach must look more obviously like paradise, so 60 palm trees were imported and planted, sand dunes were bulldozed and straggly bushes and grasses uprooted. Phi Phi Le is a designated environmental zone in a Thai national park, yet the film-makers found Maya Beach far from unspoilt.
Tourists visit the island daily.
But for a coalition of Thai environmental groups, this is not enough. They have demonstrated on set with banners, wearing DiCaprio masks with fangs dripping with blood. She stresses the relatively small sums involved compared to DiCaprio's fee. So for the first time, DiCaprio's dizzying post-Titanic celebrity is being used against him. At first he stayed silent about the demonstrations.