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Have you ever watched a movie and fallen in love with the location?
Movies have such a powerful effect on our imagination and have no doubt influenced many people to travel to their favourite movie or television locations.
If London is on your travel bucket list be sure to watch some of these movies to get you and your family thinking about what sights you’ll want to see. Trying to convince a group of friends to go with you? These movies will help!
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Floppy-haired Charles (Hugh Grant) is looking for the “The One” in this sweet, sappy Richard Curtis movie. The capital provides a picture-perfect backdrop as Charles and his group of twenty-something Londoner pals navigate the ups and downs of dating and consider settling for sub-standard partners in an effort to get down the aisle. Proof that spending every sunny Saturday at a friend’s wedding is an age old affliction.
London Locations: Charles lives (and has that romantic, rainy reunion) on Highbury Terrace in Highbury fields, the lucky guy! He also wanders along the South Bank and has a matrimonial meltdown at Smithfield’s St Bartholomew the Great.
Sherlock Holmes
Sir Conan Doyle’s sleuth gets a post-modern update with Robert Downey Jr playing a beefed-up version of Holmes.
London Locations: Shot in and around London (as well as Liverpool and Manchester), Ritchie’s London of yesteryear is a romantic place of heaving bosoms and ridiculously cool heros.
Love Actually
Richard Curtis at his best; Weaving the stories of 6 characters together, to show all the ways love makes it’s way into our lives.
London Locations: Selfridges on Oxford Street, St. Luke’s Mews in Nottinghill, Grosvenor Chapel, 10 Downey Street, the South bank… this movie is full of London sights that will inspire you to visit this capital city and to arrive by way of Heathrow airport.
The Bourne Ultimatum
Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) continues his hunt for answers while dodging the CIA.
London Locations: Waterloo Station is a battlefield at the best of times, but it becomes a chaotic setting for a fantastically tense action scene as Bourne attempts to protect Paddy Considine’s journalist.
Oliver!
Carol Reed’s classic musical in which young orphan Oliver (Mark Lester) falls in with a gang of street urchins who’ve been trained as pickpockets.
Only in London: The city’s a smoggy place filled with danger in this movie adaptation of Dicken’s novel – you definitely believe somebody like Fagin could live here.
Bend it Like Beckham
Two young girls aspire to become professional football players in Gurinder Chadha’s gentle comedy.
London Locations: Chadha captures the city’s cultural diversity beautifully as Parminder Nagra rebels against her orthodox Sikh upbringing – with Hounslow providing the perfect suburban backdrop.
Bridget Jones Diary
Renee Zellweger stars as the perpetually-single Bridget in this witty update of Pride & Prejudice.
London Locations: Visit Borough Market and you’ll easily spot Bridget’s little flat near the pub, not to mention the restaurant that’s the setting for Firth and Grant’s hilarious confrontation.
Harry Potter (series)
Eight films adapted from J.K. Rowling’s best selling book series, with Daniel Radcliffe as the lightning-scarred boy wizard.
London Locations: Sad to say, Diagon Alley doesn’t actually exist in the beloved capital. That doesn’t stop Columbus, Yates et al from lavishing the city with adoring screen time, whether it’s the Millennium Bridge getting destroyed in Half-Blood Prince or those gorgeous over-city shots in Phoenix. And of course, there’s King’s Cross station…
Ready to explore London? We’d love to help you plan that trip for you and the people you care most about. Reach out and contact us today.