The Rome Index
Rome on screen
The films that capture Rome — and the locations you can visit.
The classics
Roman Holiday (1953, Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck) is a walking tour of postwar Rome disguised as a romantic comedy — the Mouth of Truth, the Spanish Steps and Piazza Venezia all appear. La Dolce Vita (Fellini, 1960) opens with the famous Trevi Fountain sequence and remains the defining image of Rome's particular melancholy glamour.
The Colosseum on screen
Gladiator (2000) used a combination of location shooting and CGI; the interior was rebuilt in Malta and digitally extended. The Colosseum's exterior appears in dozens of films, but the hypogeum (underground tunnels) have been used far less, making the real visit surprising even for film-familiar viewers.
Recent
The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza, Sorrentino, 2013) — an Oscar-winning portrait of contemporary Rome's Baroque excess and melancholy — uses rooftop terraces, palazzi and the catacombs in a way that rewards recognition on the ground.
Filming permits and restrictions today
Rome remains a popular filming location, but modern productions face considerably stricter permit and access restrictions at major monuments than the mid-20th-century films that shaped Rome's cinematic image — much of what looks like on-location shooting in recent productions is actually filmed at Rome's Cinecittà studios using elaborate built sets.
Cinecittà itself as a destination
The historic film studio complex where much of Italian cinema's golden age was produced, including work by Fellini, is partially open to visitors — a worthwhile stop for anyone specifically interested in Rome's film history beyond the locations themselves.
