Shot on location - Films and TV-series: 2025

15 October 2025

London, England

The screenplay of the movie DIAL M FOR MURDER was written by Frederick Knott, who based it on his own television play. On 23 March 1952, it was broadcast on British television by the BBC. The stage version was also performed that same year, in theatres in London's West End and on Broadway in New York, among other places.

Dial M for Murder, 0:43:34

Thanks to the play's worldwide success, Warner Bros. bought the rights and asked Alfred Hitchcock to direct. The story is about Tony Wendice (Ray Milland), a former tennis player who wants to murder his wife Margot (Grace Kelly) because of her wealth. He knows that she is having an affair with mystery writer Mark Halliday (Robert Cummings) and wants to divorce him. To avoid suspicion, he hires Charles Swann (Anthony Dawson) to commit the murder while he is attending a party.

He arranges to call his home to distract Margot and give Swann the opportunity to strangle her. However, things do not go as Tony had planned...

The original story is set entirely in a living room in London. For the film script Frederick Knott added a few short scenes that take place outside the house, including the party Tony visits and a police officer at the police station. During the trial, only the faces of Margot and the judge are shown. All scenes were filmed at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank.

The street where Tony and Margot live is shown a few times, for which a second camera united filmed in London. In the film, Tony says his address is 61A Charrington Gardens. This street, which is supposed to be located in residential district Maida Vale (hence the letter M in the movie’s title), does not exist. Apparently, for years it was unclear which street had been used for filming. The address is not mentioned in the Warner archives either. According to the website The MacGuffin, Australian Hitchcock fan Geoff Keane discovered with the help of Google Street View that it was Collingham Road. Tony and Margot live at number 13. The house has been blurred on Google Street View.

Collingham Road is first seen at the beginning of the film when a police officer walks down the street. The houses across the street have hardly changed. The building on the far left is now partially obscured by a tree.

Dial M for Murder, 0:01:14

Collingham Road, London, 4 May 2025

Dial M for Murder, 1:13:10

Collingham Road, London, 4 May 2025

Later in the film, Inspector Hubbard (John Williams) is in the house and watches Margot walk to the front door. Grace Kelly was not in London, she was filmed in front of a projection screen.

Dial M for Murder, 1:32:30

Collingham Road, London, 4 May 2025

Mark Halliday arrives in Collingham Road by taxi. Through the windscreen of the taxi, he sees Tony going inside. When I compared the screenshot with the photo, I saw that it is not the same location. This must be a studio set, and because of the similarities, I suspect that it was built especially for this film.

Dial M for Murder, 1:13:15

Collingham Road 13, London, 4 May 2025

The website Reel Streets initially stated that the scene in which Mark Halliday smokes a cigarette on the street is a set. The text has since been adjusted, as he too was standing in front of a projection screen. It is the corner of Collingham Road and Courtfield Gardens, and the house behind him is number 15. Unfortunately, I only read this after we returned from London, so there is no photo of the street as it appears today.

Dial M for Murder, 1:30:27

Alfred Hitchcock may have chosen this location himself. Between 1926 and 1939, he lived on Cromwell Road. This street can be seen in the background when the policeman walks down the street and when Margot comes home. It is a three-minute walk from 13 Collingham Road to 153 Cromwell Road. To the left of the window is a plaque commemorating the famous director.

Cromwell Road 153, London, 4 May 2025

At the beginning of the film, Margot reads in the newspaper that the Queen Mary has arrived in Southampton harbour. For a few seconds, two men are seen looking at the passenger ship, again in front of a projection screen. I have not been able to find where these scenes were filmed. However, I did find a 26-second stock video of the first scene on the Getty Images website. Apart from Warner Bros. Studios and the year 1954, there is no reference to the film.

Dial M for Murder, 0:01:54

Dial M for Murder, 0:01:59

Screenshots © Warner Bros.

6 September 2025

Sicily, Italy

In INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY, the fifth film in the series about the archaeology professor's adventures, Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) searches for a mechanism designed by the mathematician Archimedes. This dial can reveal fissures in time and may even be used for time travel. The story is largely set in 1969, against the backdrop of the first moon landing.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:40:09

Indiana Jones has since retired, but his goddaughter Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) persuades him to help her ensure that the ancient artefact does not fall into the hands of Dr. Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen), a former Nazi who now works for NASA under the name Dr. Schmidt on the Apollo moon landing program. Filming began on 4 June 2021 at the British Pinewood Studios and ended there on 26 February 2022.

Besides in the studio, filming also took place on various locations in Great Britain, including London, Glasgow (seen in the film as New York), Glencoe and Bamburgh Castle.

Neapolis Parco Archeologico, Syracuse, 9 July 2025

In the autumn of 2021, filming took place in the Moroccan cities of Fez and Oujda, preceded by a shooting period in October at various sites and cities in Sicily. Between 4 July and 15 July 2025, we were on the Italian island where we visited several locations. I usually blog about one location, but this time I choose to write a blog post about different locations from one film, all of them in Sicily.

After escaping from Voller, Indiana and Helena, together with the young Moroccan boy Teddy Kumar (Ethann Isidore), travel by boat from Greece to Sicily in search of Archimedes' tomb. In the film, the map shows that they go ashore in Syracuse, the place where Archimedes was born and died in the third century BC.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:37:07

However, the scene that follows was filmed in Cefalù on the north coast of the island. In Piazza del Duomo (Cathedral Square), named after the cathedral that also appears in the film, Teddy sits on the steps in front of the church while Helena buys sandwiches.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:37:10

Duomo, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:37:29

Piazza del Duomo, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:37:52

Piazza del Duomo, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:38:18

Piazza del Duomo, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

A little later, she walks over to Indiana, who is buying supplies for their expedition. The shop is located on the same square, on the corner of Via Seminario and Via Mandralisca.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:38:41

Via Seminario, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

Teddy buys an ice cream and walks to the beach. He stands in Porto Pescare (Fishing Port) and looks out over the Molo di Cefalú (Cefalú Pier). A moment later, he sees Voller.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:39:16

Porto Pescare, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:39:26

Porto Pescare, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

From Via Vittore Emanuele, Indiana sees Teddy being kidnapped by Voller and his henchmen. The streets of Cefalù were modified in detail to resemble an Italian town in the 1960s.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:39:41

Via Vittore Emanuele, Cefalù, 14 July 2025

The scene that follows, in which Indiana and Helena steal a car from a newlywed couple, was filmed in Castellammare del Golfo, west of Palermo on the other side of the island. We did not visit this village, but we did visit the next location: the temple of Segesta in the Parco Archeologico, located in north-western Sicily. This Doric-style sanctuary was built around 425 BC but was never completed. Indiana and Helena stop their car here but pay no attention to the temple; they walk staright to the cave where Archimedes' tomb is said to be located.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:40:52

Tempio di Segesta, 6 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:41:03

Tempio di Segesta, 6 July 2025

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 1:41:04

Tempio di Segesta, 6 July 2025

The entrance to the cave is called Orecchio di Dionisio (Ear of Dionysius) in both the film and in real life. It is not located near the temple of Segesta but in the Neapolis Parco Archeologico in Syracuse. The painter Caravaggio came up with the name in 1586. It is not a natural cave but a limestone quarry that was excavated in Greco-Roman times to store water. The cave is 65 metres deep and there is no tomb. In the film, the cave appears much deeper, but these scenes were shot in the studio.