Before there was a new superhero movie every other week, Billy Madison used the Parkwood Estate in Ontario, Canada, as the location where Billy is chased around by an imaginary penguin. That same mansion later became Charles Xavier’s school for gifted youngsters in X-Men.
The Quality Café has made its way into tons of Los Angeles-based movies. Some of the movies that make the list are Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Se7en, Gone in 60 Seconds, Training Day, Catch Me If You Can, and countless others. 500 Days of Summer even recreated almost the same shot perfectly from Old School. The Quality Café has been closed for years, but still making plenty of money thanks to Hollywood.
During the filming of Aliens James Cameron used the Acton Lane Power Station in West London for an alien-infested colony on Earth. All the toxic materials were removed and the whole location was painted silver. Tim Burton used the location a few years later as Axis Chemical Works in Batman.
In 1928, an oil tycoon built The Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills, but when it was made into a city park in 1971, it became a staple for Hollywood. You can see the checkerboard floors in movies like The Big Lebowski, There Will Be Blood, The Muppets, and many TV shows. Star Trek Into Darkness used the mansion as a futuristic London hospital with a little CG makeover.
The Bradbury Building is a Historical Landmark and one of the oldest office buildings in Los Angeles. The building’s famous stairs have been in movies as old as The Artist, but more recently in Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner. 500 Days of Summer also used the building for the movie’s final scene.
Ghostbusters and its sequel used a decommissioned New York Firehouse for the exterior shots for the movie’s headquarters. The interior shots were done in a Los Angeles-based fire hall. That same fire hall was used as an auto shop in The Mask.
Fox Plaza was the location for Die Hard’s tower of destruction, but that’s not the last time the studio’s headquarters made an appearance in a film. The lobby of Fox Plaza was used in the opening sequence of Speed. The plaza also appeared in the comedy Airheads.
The Hatfield House is a go-to for films that need a huge mansion. Its Long Gallery has been used in Sherlock Holmes, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and even Tim Burton’s Batman.
In Spider-Man, Peter Parker dropped Mary Jane off at a rooftop garden in the heart of Manhattan. In the Netflix series Daredevil, you see Wilson Fisk meeting with fellow crime boss in a similar rooftop garden, hinting that the two heroes are soaring over the New York rooftops.
The Vasquez Rocks are a jagged rock formation in California named after the outlaw who used them as a hiding place. The rocks have been appearing in movies since the 1930s. They made an appearance in an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series titled “Arena.”
The rocks have also been in Blazing Saddles, Army of Darkness, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and the landscape of the planet Vulcan for the 2009 reboot of Star Trek.
Via Screen Rant
