10 Real-World Filming Locations You Really Need To Visit

6. Germania From Gladiator (Surrey, England)

Gladiator is an epic film in every sense of the word but its cinematography and sets particularly stand out. Somehow, they managed to create Ancient Rome in Malta and various other cities and countries in places like Morocco and Spain. The one that stands out to me however, is the opening scene in Germania featuring the battle that everybody remembers. It is not a backlot or even a set, but a real forest just outside of Surrey, close to all the major studios like Elstree and Pinewood. You'd be forgiven for suspecting that if the forest was real it was probably abroad somewhere due to the strange nature of the trees and the sheer size of it, but it appears it's actually in England. Bourne Wood, where the scenes were filmed, has now become a popular film location and you'll probably recognise it from films like Captain America, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Robin Hood, War Horse and most recently Thor: The Dark World where it again stood in for a far off land (this time on a different planet.) The brilliant thing is it's open all year round and with it being so close to London it's very easy to make a day trip there using the trains. Who knows, you might even see a film being shot there. When this author visited about six years ago there were parts of The Golden Compass being filmed there, which at the time looked good, but it turned out to be pretty bad in the end.