10 Abandoned Movie Sets You Can Visit In Real Life
Hollywood's most famous ghost towns you can enjoy...
Film settings are some of the most important parts of filmmaking. Before we had lavish special effects, sets relied on the construction of facades on-location.
Whilst studios have become more and more adept at producing digitally realised worlds instead of building real world locations, there are still some amazing long-forgotten settlements that have been either purpose-built or re-purposed for big-budget blockbusters to make use of.
These can include areas like long-forgotten ghost towns whose inhabitants simply couldn't continue to weather out a living after all opportunities had passed by. They can be phantom places built for films that weren't ever made, or the remains of props and buildings left out in the desert, a relic of the movie industry.
Getting to explore your favourite fictional world is a desire by nearly every film fan, and here's a round up of some of the dilapidated, abandoned or otherwise repurposed film sets that globe-trotting cinephiles should add to their "must-visit" list for their post-pandemic travels.
10. Tatooine, Tunisia - Star Wars
One of the most evocative, iconic locales in George Lucas's Star Wars saga has to be the desert planet Tatooine. It's the place which truly forces Luke Skywalker into pursuing becoming a Jedi following the massacre of his own family, and as such remains an important place to many a Star Wars fan.
Being the first planet introduced to us in the galaxy far far away all the way back in 1977, Tatooine has earned a special place of significance despite its impoverished appearance on screen.
Thankfully, then, there's plenty of Tatooine left out in our own world for for would-be Jedi to explore.There, you'll find a replica version of the Lars household, some of the remnants of Mos Espa and Mos Eisley too. Just head out to the Tunisian desert, and you'll eventually come across some of the tell-tale structures that made up the exteriors of Tatooine's dwellings.
Unfortunately, some of the sites are not all that well-maintained as the film industry has not been kind to Tunisia, finding other locales to shoot instead. However, thanks to teams of volunteers and some determined locals, a little bit of Tatooine lives on.