It’s hard to think of movies made in Hollywood without seeing images of the American West. Golden deserts and awe-inspiring canyons, majestic mountain tops, wide serene lakes, and vineyard hills are just a few of the unforgettable vistas often memorialized in many of our favorite movies.
The diversity of the American West landscapes is definitely one of the biggest calling cards to the film industry. No wonder Hollywood quickly relocated to California in the early 20th century, after just a few short years stationed in New York.
So without further ado, we’d like to share with you a few of the top landscape film locations in the American West and the iconic movies that make them famous:
1. Glacier National Park, Montana: Cattle Queen of Montana, Heaven’s Gate
2. Paradise Valley, Montana: A River Runs Through It, The Horse Whisperer
3. Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming: The Big Sky, Shane
4. Devil’s Tower, Wyoming: Close Encounters of the Third Kind
5. Badlands National Park, South Dakota: Dances With Wolves
6. Pyramid Lake, Nevada: The Misfits
7. Lake Tahoe and Truckee, California: A Place in the Sun, The Gold Rush
8. Monterey Peninsula and Point Lobos, California: Vertigo, The Sandpiper
9. Mount Whitney and Lone Pine, California: High Sierra
10. Santa Ynez Valley, California: Sideways
11. Death Valley, California: Zabriskie Point, Star Wars
12. Zion National Park, Utah: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Jeremiah Johnson
13. Monument Valley, Utah/Arizona border: Stagecoach, The Searchers, Easy Rider
14. Moab, Utah and its surroundings: Rio Grande, Thelma & Louise, Geronimo
15. San Juan Mountains in Ouray County, Colorado: True Grit
16. Chama River Valley, New Mexico: All the Pretty Horses, City Slickers, Wyatt Earp
17. Zia Pueblo Reserve, New Mexico: All the Pretty Horses, The Missing
18. Alamo Village in Bracketville, Texas: The Alamo
We’re sure you can also add a few more to this list based on some of your personal favorite movies. Feel free to include them in the comment section below.
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