Casino Movie Locations Filming

4/8/2022

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Bright lights, blackjack tables, glitz and glamour – it’s no wonder larger-than-life Las Vegas is a favourite location for filmmakers. Over 100 movies have featured Sin City’s over-the-top casinos and iconic Strip views. Some of Las Vegas’ film locations have been and gone, and others only ever existed on a Hollywood sound stage. But there are still plenty of spots around the Strip and downtown where you can see where scenes from movies old and new were filmed, from Viva Las Vegas to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and Ocean’s 11 to – er – Ocean’s Eleven.

Here are the locations where the filming of Casino Royale took place. A lot of Casino Royale was filmed in the Czech Republic, although, for the most part, it was pretending to be somewhere else. There was no filming in Montenegro itself (a very country with a small railroad network).
Nov 19, 2006 Many visitors ask where are filmed new movie “Casino Royale”. Here, you can find all location where all important scenes of new James Bond movie is filmed: “The Canals”, Venice, Veneto, Italy (exteriors) Albany House, New Providence Island, Bahamas (James Bond return trip to the Bahamas – Beach Villa of Solange and Dimitrios).

If you are a big fan of the Expendables Film Franchise, you must know that there are several places outside of the United States where the filming took place.Here are three filming locations that you could put in your travelling bucket list. – Rio de Janeiro The First Expendables took the filming location in Rio de Janeiro as well as other parts in Brazil such as Mangaratiba, Niteroi.

So join me and follow in the footsteps of Dean Martin, Elvis and George Clooney on this Las Vegas film locations walking tour. The whole walk covers almost five miles (with a bus/taxi shortcut) but a word of warning: Las Vegas can get incredibly hot, so make sure you’ve got a bottle of water and a hat on you, and avoid the middle of the day in the summer.

Read more: Visiting Las Vegas on a budget

A Las Vegas film locations walking tour

The Tropicana

Start your Las Vegas film locations walking tour towards the south of the Strip at the Tropicana. It’s one of Las Vegas’ original 1950s casinos, and although it’s had a few facelifts since then it’s still kept a touch of vintage style, including the 1957 red Chevy parked out front.

The Tropicana has had links to the Mob both on-screen and off during its history, and it features as Michael Corleone’s casino in the first Godfather film (though it was renamed the Tropigala to avoid any legal issues – not that its stage name was too hard to guess!). The casino was also home to the French-inspired Folies Bergère show for almost 50 years, whose scantily clad showgirls feature in Elvis’ Viva Las Vegas and the 1971 Bond film Diamonds are Forever.

Vintage Tropicana

The Bellagio

From the Tropicana, follow the Strip north for a mile until you reach the Bellagio. The Bellagio plays a big role in the 2001 remake (and its sequels) of the 1960s Frank Sinatra Brat Pack movie Ocean’s 11. Ocean’s Eleven producer Jerry Weintraub and Bellagio owner Steve Wynn were friends so the production team got a 24-hour, all-areas pass to film there for five weeks.

Among the locations featured in the film are the casino floor, botanical gardens, art gallery, Picasso restaurant and the lobby with its Dale Chihuly glass ceiling. But the most famous scene was shot by the lake at the front of the casino, where the gang gather at the end of the film to watch the fountains choreographed to music. You can see the sound and light show every 30 minutes in the afternoons and every 15 minutes between 8pm and midnight.

Caesars Palace

Next cross over West Flamingo Road to the Bellagio’s neighbour, Caesars Palace (0.2 miles). Caesars Palace opened in the 1960s and took design inspiration from the Roman Empire, with a giant statue of Julius Caesar in the entrance and décor dripping with statues, mosaics, fountains and marble. On screen it most famously featured in The Hangover (and the film’s follow-up Part III) as the hotel where the guys stay during their drama-filled stag weekend.

Caesars Palace’s entrance, lobby, check in desk and the Garden of the Gods pool are all used in the film. But although their swanky room is based on the hotel’s Emperors Suite, in reality it was recreated in a Hollywood studio (I guess Caesars didn’t fancy hosting that tiger).

The real Emperors Suite does feature in Rain Man though, as where the brothers spend the night after a big blackjack win, and it’s still nicknamed the Rain Man Suite. Caesars Palace is a bit of a film favourite, and you can also see it in Iron Man, Intolerable Cruelty and Dreamgirls.

Caesars Palace’s lobby

The Venetian

Leave Ancient Rome behind and travel to Venice as you carry on walking up the Strip to The Venetian (0.6 miles). It includes replicas of famous Venetian landmarks like the Piazza San Marco, St Mark’s Campanile, Doge’s Palace and Rialto Bridge along with its own gondoliers. It sits on the site of the old Sands casino, which was a major filming locations for the original Ocean’s 11.

The Venetian itself features in the 2001 comedy Rat Race, which starred John Cleese and Rowan Atkinson, where the casino’s eccentric owner devises a competition where teams have to race from Vegas to Silver City, New Mexico to win $2 million dollars. One of the hotel’s suites is also used in the Sandra Bullock film Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous.

Circus Circus

Carry on north along the Strip until you reach Circus Circus (1.3 miles). It’s home to the largest big top in the world and you can see all the classic circus acts like clowns, jugglers, trapeze artists and tightrope walkers in their free shows (every hour from 11.30am).

Although Circus Circus gets a mention in Hunter S. Thompson’s book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, when it came to making the movie version the casino owners refused permission to film there. So the producers created their own version of Circus Circus’ merry-go-round bar (the real one’s sadly no longer there). The real Circus Circus is seen on screen in two very different spy films – Diamonds are Forever and Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.

Roll up roll up

Graceland Wedding Chapel

The next hop is a bit longer, so you might want to either catch the Deuce bus or take a taxi downtown to Graceland Wedding Chapel (2.2 miles). The chapel opened in 1947 has been used for many celebrity weddings. Elvis visited in the 1960s and gave them permission to use the Graceland name, and it was the first place you could get married by an Elvis impersonator.

On screen, the Graceland Wedding Chapel is where Matthew Perry and Salma Hayek get married in the 1990s rom-com Fools Rush In, and it also features in the film version of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. If you fancy trying it out for yourself while you’re in Vegas, then their wedding and vow renewal packages start from $199 (and Elvis is optional!).

The Graceland Wedding Chapel – photo credit time anchor on Flickr

Atomic Liquors

Walk up South 6th Street and then turn right along Fremont Street – home to nightly sound and light shows at the Fremont Street Experience – until you reach Atomic Liquors (0.8 miles). Atomic Liquors is the oldest freestanding bar in Las Vegas. It opened in 1945 and gets its name from the days when drinkers would climb onto the roof with a drink in hand to watch explosions from the nuclear test site 50 miles down the road (that and the atomic-strength cocktails).

The bar is another location from the first Hangover film as well as featuring in Casino. It’s been restored to its former glory and you can almost imagine one of its former regulars like Barbra Streisand or Sammy Davis Jr might be about to pull up a stool next to you.

Neon Museum

Finally take North 9th Street under the expressway and out to the Neon Museum (0.9 miles) – it’s not the smartest neighbourhood, so if you’re on your own or at night you might want to take a taxi instead. The Neon Boneyard and Museum is where signs from classic casinos like the Golden Nugget and Stardust come to spend their retirement. There are over 150 signs – and a few giant fibreglass models – which date back to the 1930s and tell the story of the city.

The original boneyard location (which was known as the Young Electric Sign Co then) is where Danny DeVito’s character comes to a sticky end in the sci-fi comedy Mars Attacks! Since then the signs have been relocated to a new site which was used in the 2013 Michael Douglas film Last Vegas as well as lots of music videos. Even the museum entrance is recycled – it was the lobby of the old La Concha Motel which had its own taste of film stardom in Casino.

The Neon Museum – photo credit Graeme Maclean on Flickr

Las Vegas film locations walking tour map

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In Skyfall we saw James Bond visit locations both exotic and closer to home. Here we take a look at where the 23rd James Bond movie was filmed.

United Kingdom

Skyfall began filming on November 7th 2011 at Pinewood Studios and various London locations.

The Pinewood sets included interiors and exteriors of the Golden Dragon Casino in Macao. Bond’s arrival, including 300 floating lanterns and dragon heads, was actually shot at Pinewood’s Paddock Tank. And while location shooting took place at Charing Cross station, the tube train crash took place on a Pinewood set.

Silva’s island, supposedly somewhere near Macao, was another set. The island lair was inspired by the Japanese island of Hashima, until 1974 an offshore coal mining facility. Exterior shots of the real island were used as Severine’s boat approached.

London

Skyfall is the first film in which much of the action takes place in the UK and London featured prominently.

Cast and crew were seen at locations including Whitehall, Smithfield Market and Trafalgar Square during the first half of November. This included the scene in which Bond meets Q the National Gallery. Turner’s The Fighting Temeraire, which they briefly discuss, is in room 34.

A further day was spent at The Four Seasons Hotel in Westferry Circus, Canary Wharf in Docklands. Doubling as a hotel in Shanghai, Daniel Craig was filmed swimming lengths in the pool.

More scenes were filmed with Naomie Harris on the roof of the Department of Energy and Climate Change in early December. A night shoot took place at Charing Cross station, doubling for Temple. And Daniel Craig was at the wheel of an Aston Martin DB5 on and Childers Street. The lockup in which the car was stored is just off Arklow Road. The area has changed slightly since filming but Bond’s lockup appears to be appears unit 7.

In February further scenes were filmed at various locations in London. These included a daytime shoot in Trinity Square, where M meets Mallory. Filming also took place along Millbank and on Vauxhall Bridge. From there M watches from her car as an explosion rocks MI6 headquarters.

Although largely absent from the final film, scenes were shot of M paying her respects to those MI6 personnel killed in the explosion at Greenwich Royal Naval College. And the interiors of M’s house were shot 82 Cadogan Square, once owned John Barry.

Another London location to appear in Skyfall is Broadgate Tower (20 Primrose Street) with its distinctive lattice of x-braces, again doubling for Shanghai. This the scene when Patrice is dropped off at a modern metal and glass skyscraper with Bond on his tail as he watches as an art buyer is shot dead in an adjacent building.

Scotland

February 2012 saw two Aston martin DB5s in action on and around the A82 in the Scottish highlands. These shots were used when Bond drives M to Skyfall Lodge.

The scene in which Bond gazes at the mist covered mountains was shot on the Dalness road off the A82 looking west (see the map for the precise location. When they get going again they are on the A82 headed northwest, close to the turnoff to Glencoe Mountain Resort.

But while Bond’s ancestral home was supposedly in Scotland, Skyfall Lodge was actually a set built on Ministry of Defence land in Surrey. A couple of Scottish locations had been considered but ultimately rejected. First was Duntrune Castle in Argyle. The second was Dalness Lodge in Glen Etive, which apparently was at one time owned by a nephew of Ian Fleming.

While Skyfall Lodge was purpose-built for filming, the body of water behind it and mountainous landscape look like footage shot in the vicinity of Glencoe and added in post-production.

Southeast England

The production headed for a night shoot at Royal Ascot’s grandstand at the end of November 2011. This was the scene in which Patrice arrives at Shanghai International Airport.

Late January 2012 saw crew members arrive in Elstead to begin work on a huge set on Hankley Common. There, on land owned by the MOD, they built a manor house and chapel. Details included fake trees and the graves of Bond’s parents.

Filming took place on March, including a night shoot involving a helicopter when the entire structure was blown to smithereens.

Turkey

A large crew headed to Turkey for to set up to shoot during April and May at three distinct locations. First shooting with two crews in Adana and Fethiye. After finishing they headed to Eminönü district of Istanbul.

Adana

Filming took place at the Varda Viaduct in the province of Adana when Bond and Patrice are on top of the train. It is this bridge from which Bond falls after Moneypenny is told to “take the bloody shot” and accidentally shoots Bond.

Movie Locations In Georgia

Fethiye

After finishing in Scotland, Craig and crew flew from Glasgow to Dalaman and on to Fethiye on Turkey’s south-west coast.

It was hear that Bond was enjoying death at a beach bar. However, don’t both going to look for it. The bar was built for filming and dismantled afterwards.

Istanbul

The building Bond exits after discovering the missing hard disc drive and dying MI6 agent was once the headquarters of Deutsche Orientbank. It’s on the corner formed by Fındıkçı Remzi Sk and Büyük Postane Cd.

Moneypenny picks him up in a Land Rover and drives along Büyük Postane Cd on the tail of Patrice, who turns right onto Postahane Yanı Sk.

The outdoor food market where they ram Patrice’s Audi is in Eminönü Square. When Patrice continues on a police motorbike Bond steals one too, tailing him to the Grand Bazaar. There they ride up the steps onto the roof and across the roof tiles.

In several shots you see spectacular Nuruosmaniye Mosque, as well as the massive Bayezid II Mosque. They then ride through the bazaar and continue riding at high speed through the streets.

Locations In Casino Royale

Shanghai

While no first unit filming took place in China, the second unit visited Shanghai during January 2012 to film the Blade Runner-esque cityscape and the taxi in which Patrice travels from the airport.

In reality Royal Ascot doubled the airport, the rooftop swimming pool and the external shots of the building to which Patrice heads for the assassination were both filmed in London (see above).

Hashima Island

Although the scenes at Silva’s island lair were all filmed on a sound stage, the island was, strangely enough, based on a real location.