A Movie Lover's Guide to London's Famous Filming Locations

From Harry Potter to James Bond, London is an ideal tourist location for cinephiles and movie location hunters. Take it from a lover of film, the lesser known locations are often better. Here’s an ultimate guide to five of our favourite spots in the city that brought to life the marvellous characters we know and love… or sometimes know and hate.

Bridget Jones’ Diary – Borough Market

Is Renee Zellweger the best American attempt at a British accent? We reckon so.

In 2001, Bridget Jones’ Diary, based on Helen Fielding’s sensational book, hits cinema’s and a brand new British film icon was born. The film is anchored by the effervescent charm of its Texan lead, bouncing off the brilliantly cast talents of Hugh Grant and Colin Firth. Naturally, our very own Bridget becomes a hit that launches 3 sequels and earns a statue in Leicester Square.

The films, for the most part, are funny, adorable, and very endearing as we see the titular character reckon with love and life. Now, because it’s a rom-com, it has to follow this rule – our protagonist will be constantly described as an impoverished mess that can’t get their life together whilst simultaneously living in a beautiful flat in an even more beautiful location, that you and I could only ever dream about living in if we won the lottery.

The makers of Bridget tick off this rule in spades as Bridget lives in the heart of Borough Market above the Globe pub.

If you are reading this and you are not from London; this would be impossible. This is Monica’s enormous apartment in Friends or Frasier’s home cum art gallery. Not only does she live in possibly one of the most expensive postcodes but, dear readers, the film-makers have the gall to show our Bridge happily strolling through Borough Market picking up ingredients for dinner on her way home. Impossible.

At its quietest time Borough Market seems to have the population of a smaller European country, even more so with the power of viral TikToks.

Guardians of the Galaxy – Millennium Bridge

Here’s a fun one from the Marvel glory days. Back in 2014 Marvel released the Guardians of the Galaxy and for those of us who were old enough to remember when they announced it there was a great big “huh?”. Oh us of little faith. 

Guardians of the Galaxy was a top-tier Marvel blockbuster, with all three of the films arguably holding their own in their own way in the canon. James Gunn introduced the world to Chris Pratt, made wrestler Dave Bautista a comedic powerhouse with hidden depths (a feat he would repeat again with John Cena), and made Zoe Saldana green instead of blue. It is not just a classic marvel film, but a classic film. It absolutely nails the found family dynamic. Chefs kiss

Eagle-eyed Londoners will notice that they snuck Millenium Bridge (aka the wobbly bridge) into Xandar. You see it early on during the Gamora and Quill chase and again in Act 3 during the battle of Xandar with John C. Reilly’s family running across it. This bridge has also been used in 28 Weeks Later and Harry Potter.

Thor: The Dark World – Old Naval College, Greenwich

Everyone’s favourite Marvel film right? Maybe not… It might be fair to say that most fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe would probably rank this film near the bottom of their list. For all its crimes (like having the MCU’s most boring villain and making its protagonist as humourless as possible) the film’s most egregious trespass, especially for Londoners, happens during the final fight.

During the battle with Malekith the Accursed, Thor is transported to Charing Cross and turns to a helpful commuter to ask how to get to Greenwich, The tube-rider responds “take this train, it’s three stops.” Was no-one on set a Londoner when they were filming that day? And if so, it’s bloody easy to check!

The response should have been: “take the old Northern Line south, that’s the black line on the map, to Waterloo Station, now when you get off at Waterloo, it’s a bit of a maze, but you want to find the Jubilee line, that's the grey line, take that east and jump off at North Greenwich. Then, head up the escalators and the bus station will be right in front of you. Jump on the 188 or the 422 but I tell you the traffic in Maze Hill is gonna be MURDER this time of day cause it’s rush hour…”

Anyway… Thor finds his way to the movie’s climactic battle, located at the Old Royal Naval College, an architectural beauty in the heart of Greenwich. In addition to its history, the site is worth a visit for film locations in London. Many iconic movies and shows have chosen this location to film, from Thor to Bridgerton (see Penelope and Colin’s wedding venue).

We also might be seeing another Malekith appearing at the ONC soon as Alex Garland’s upcoming Elden Ring film for A24 was also filmed there and, dear readers, this tour guide can’t bloody wait.

28 Days Later -- Piccadilly Circus

Speaking of Mr. Garland. You may know that he originally cut his teeth writing lower budget British thrillers and horrors usually directed by the ever-interesting Danny Boyle. One of their most successful efforts was 2002’s ’28 Days Later’. 

Now, at the moment we seem to be entering another era of incredible low-budget horror with Kane Parson’s ‘Backrooms’ and Curry Barker’s ‘Obsession’ absolutely dominating the box office. Both brilliant films, but do they match the cultural impact of 28 Days Later?

Arguably, this film kicked off the Zombie movie renaissance, walking so Shaun of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead and the Walking Dead could run. 28 Days was the little film that could -- on a 7 million pound budget -- and created a billion dollar genre that we thought was dead and buried. I guess that’s the problem with Zombies huh… they -- well, you get it. 

The budget was so low that Boyle and Garland actually couldn’t afford to pay for exclusive use of the iconic locations seen in the beginning of the film. When Cillian Murphy’s Jim wakes up from his coma and wanders these desolate locations -- Piccadilly Circus, Westminster Bridge and Big Ben -- this was actually filmed at 4am in the Summer when the British sun was rising.

They tried and succeeded in making sure the people stumbling out of clubs didn’t wander into shot. Boyle also got his daughter and her friends to flirt with cab drivers to stop them from driving through – true story!

RocknRolla – Cambridge Circus

In 2009 Ritchie made RocknRolla, a classic with London gangster narrative, bun fights and merging storylines. It’s got a great cast firing on all cylinders (charming Gerry Butler! Idris Elba returning home! Super Hans!) and Guy Ritchie seems to be having a ball making it. 

Halfway through the movie, our lead character, Archie, played by the wonderful Mark Strong, goes to meet “the Tank” to find out some information. The Tank, played by the often misused Nonzo Anozie, runs a ticket tout empire in the West End so he knows absolutely everything that anyone in the underworld would need to know. Archie walks around Cambridge Circus looking to meet him. He then heads down the road next to the Theatre to find Tank’s office (his car) and of course he’s watching the DVD (wiki that one, kids) of Remains of the Day (and that).

Fun scene, fun mise en scene, and I always think about it every time I walk past the Palace Theatre where Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is currently playing.

That’s a wrap, folks! But we have plenty more where that came from. Join our London Movie Locations Tour for an exploration of cinema in the city.