Academy Awards: Best Picture Nominations on Location

It’s that time again: awards season! While the Golden Globes have come and gone, the top dog of all award shows, the Academy Awards, is right around the corner on March 7th. Movies nominated at the Academy Awards for best picture are the cream of the crop and the best of the best, and one thing all these movies have in common is the unique and realistic locations chosen and the way characters’ lives are built up around them. In anticipation of the big day on Sunday, we’ve lined up a list of of our favorite best picture nominees and the ways in which each movie reflected the authenticity of each location. With a wide variety of subject matters and locations for each movie, it should come as no surprise if you get the itch to travel and experience these locations for yourself.

Avatar

Zhangjiajie's Southern Sky Column (Image: ABC News)

This sci-fi futuristic drama tells the tale of a paraplegic war veteran, Jake, who decides to take an unprecedented mission to the planet Pandora where he witnesses the corrupt U.S. government’s interest in mining precious stones over the well-being of Pandora’s people.

To create the surreal, yet mind-blowingly beautiful locations, director James Cameron traveled far and wide including Hawaii, California, and New Zealand to simulate the planet of Pandora. Cameron utilized the relatively undisturbed beaches and forests of Miramar and Wellington, New Zealand to create an idyllic backdrop while taking additional inspiration from other parts of the globe.

Pandora’s floating mountains bare an uncanny resemblance to the “Southern Sky Column” of Zhangijajie in the southern Hunan province of China. In fact, it’s been debated whether Chinese officials had the mountains’ name officially changed to “Avatar Hallelujah Mountain.” Cameron used both the Kauai and Hawaii islands for additional beach and forest locations because of their pristine conditions and additional footage was filmed in El Segundo and Playa Vista, California.

Inglourious Basterds

Filming in Bad Schandau (Image: Berliner Morgenpost)

Tarrantino’s much buzzed about war movie takes place in Germany and France and follows the story of two groups of people trying to assassinate the Nazi political leadership. Much of the filming was done in Germany in the famous Babelsberg Studios in Potsdam as well as Bad Schandau, a small town near the border of the Czech Republic. Bad Schandau’s close proximity to Dresden’s mountains the Saxon Switzerland, with almost 1,0000 climbing areas and a beautiful national park, has made the town a tourist hot spot in the summer months. Accordingly, Bad Schandau has made many luxurious accommodations for all of the tourists including hotels and villas. In 1920, “Bad,” which means spa in English, was added to Schandau’s name to reflect the many spas that were created to please the many tourists who come through the city.

Up in the Air

George Clooney as Ryan in Up in the Air (Image: Movie Talk)

Up in the Air showcases both the fun and difficult aspects of living out of a suitcase and constantly jet-setting across the United States. As a movie that completely revolves around travel, it should come as no surprise that the constant “location” is the act of traveling itself. Both the two main characters Ryan and Alex live majority of their lives zooming all across the country. Up in the Air used many different cities to reflect the many places that both characters visited for work. Majority of the film took place in St. Louis, Missouri with almost 80 sets in 50 different locations within the city. Five days of filming 20 hour days were spent at Lambert-St. Louis Airport, where specifically Concourse C and D were repeatedly used as other airports depicted in the film. Additional filming also took place in Omaha, Las Vegas, and Miami for longer stops for the Ryan and Alex. Of the 50 days allotted for this film, eight were devoted to shooting aerial coverage to enhance the concept of constantly being in transit through various airport locations.

Hurt Locker

The opening scene of Hurt Locker (Image: NY Daily News)

Hurt Locker’s story demonstrates one of the toughest jobs in Iraq for soldiers: to disarm roadside bombs in the heat of battle. As the story progresses, the members of this unit become more and more wild as they encounter the endless violence and craziness of Iraq. Filming mostly took place in Amman, Jordan and Kuwait. The location of Jordan was selected because of it’s proximity to Iraq and the filming of the movie even had some locations taking place a mere three miles from the Iraq border. The authenticity of Hurt Locker was only enhanced by the Iraqi extras and the heat and sweat were real-life special effects that made filming an incredibly tough experience for both the actors and crews.  The lead actors even trained with real Army EOD teams so they would understand the exact conditions real soldiers face while stationed in Iraq.

District 9

Filmed in Johannesburg, South Africa (Image: It's Art)

This science fiction thriller uses the theme of apartheid in South Africa as a prominent subject throughout the movie, with aliens playing the metaphor of humans forcefully evacuated and isolated to refugee camps. Much of the filming took place in Chiawelo, Soweto, an urban center of Johannesburg. The actual impoverished and low-income neighborhoods depicted as District 9 was a realistic depiction of where people were forced into awful government-supported housing in District 6 during the apartheid-era.

Precious

Precious on location in New York (Image: Political Poetry)

Set in the heart of Harlem, Precious is the tale of a girl overcoming the disadvantages she was born into. Living with an abusive mother and a father who rapes and impregnates her twice, Precious is sent to an alternative school where she learns to escape from reality via fantasies. The locations used in in the film were meant to properly reflect the income and demographics of the neighborhood where Precious lived. Filming took place at the Coney Island Hospital, downtown Brooklyn, many different locations throughout Harlem, and the Inwood neighborhood of Manhattan.