The province of Almeria is a haven for movie lovers.
Sightseeing cinema in the province of Almeria is a very enriching experience. The area has been the perfect location for more than 500 films throughout the last 60 years.
Perfect Landscapes
The province of Almeria has been an ideal place for filming hundreds of projects due to its great geographic diversity, which combines virgin beaches, wide deserts, and mountain ranges full of vegetation, cliffs, and coasts.
The landscapes that make up the province of Almeria have made it the ideal place to film hundreds of movies and series produced throughout the world.
The province of Almeria is one of the few areas in the world that can boast these characteristics—and it is not just about the landscapes that can be seen in these projects, but also about the combination of spectacular landscapes with the solitude that characterizes them.
In the case of beaches, a great effort has been made to keep them virgin, which has captured the attention of filmmakers and producers around the planet.
Expert Attention
Thanks to its peculiar characteristics, which combine great landscapes with few people, Almeria has attracted the attention of many filmmakers, as well as of the press and other specialists in the seventh art. Thus, hundreds of tourist activities and routes have been organized that focus on the province’s cinematographic potential.
In Almeria, hundreds of familiarization trips are held for tour operators and members of the press so that they can get to know the province in depth. In this way, tour operators can offer their clients information about the province of Almeria, which they have obtained first-hand.
Additionally, press trips bring together the best tourism and film journalists in Almeria, so that they can learn about, and spread through the media, the pleasures that can be enjoyed in Almeria, largely due to the cinematographic factor that envelops the region.
This, together with the work of the Almeria Deputation, which seeks to exalt and protect the area, have given the province of Almeria an important position in the field of film tourism, not only in Spain but also in the rest of Europe and the world.
First Stage
The province of Almeria is a favourite location for the filming of movies, series, and commercials, making it a world reference in terms of film tourism.
Between 1965 and 1975, Almeria's popularity as a film centre was booming. However, the province's popularity as a location for movies, series, and commercials declined between 1975 and 2013. Then, interest rose again.
There has been such a boom in cinematographic interest in the province of Almeria in recent years that it has been called "The New Golden Age" of filming in Almeria.
During Almeria's first successful decade as a location for cinematographic filming, well-known films such as “El Cid” (1961), “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962), “Cleopatra” (1963), and “Patton” (1970) were recorded on its soil.
Its arid landscapes also became an ideal place to recreate scenes linked to Western or Wild West films, such as the popular films starring Clint Eastwood: “A Fistful of Dollars” and “For a Few Dollars More”.
In addition, during this time, hundreds of films on different subjects were recorded, from Western to adventure, as well as commercials and television programs, although the latter in a smaller proportion.
Even during the dark times of filming in Almeria, a few films were produced here, allowing the province to stay alive as an ideal location for filming. In 1982, the popular film “Conan the Barbarian” was recorded in these lands. In 1986, Almeria was the site for the recording of “Solarbabies”, while two years later, in 1988, filming of “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen” took place.
The last film recorded during that difficult time for Almeria as a location and set was “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade”, filmed in 1989.
The Blessed Year of 2013
The new interest that arose in 2013, fuelled by tourism policies and outstanding communication management, gave rise to this new golden age, which has lasted to the present day. Not only has interest been generated among filmmakers and producers, but Almeria has become home to the development of some of the most prolific cinema tourism in all of Europe.
“Exodus: Gods and Kings”, which came out on the film market in 2014, was the movie that restored Almeria to its former brilliance and quickly aroused the interest of directors, screenwriters, and film producers around the world.
The director of this film, Ridley Scott, chose Almeria because it had the perfect landscapes for the movie’s purposes. This generated a great amount of publicity for the province. The media attention that Almeria received thanks to the filming of this movie aroused the interest of international film producers, and the brightness that seemed to have dimmed quickly regained its brilliance.
The Andalusia Film Commission, an organization responsible for promoting the province as a filming location and film destination, catalogued the filming of “Exodus: Gods and Kings” as the most important development in the last 20 years, generating nearly 3,500 hires of technical personnel and temporary employees, as well as more than 15,000 overnight stays.
Game of Thrones
With the arrival of this new boom as a destination for filming, the province of Almeria soon became one of the favourite regions among production houses.
Films such as “Assassin’s Creed” (2016) and the series “Mar de plástico” (2015) were filmed in the natural settings of Almeria. However, the real boom came with the filming of the sixth season of the successful series “Game of Thrones”.
The impressive scenes, castles, and other environments that were observed in the series aroused the interest of moviegoers, directors, producers, and specialists in the subject, who discovered that many of the scenes had been shot in Almeria, including the Alcazaba of Almeria, where the first episode of the sixth season was filmed: Death of Doran Martell, starring actor Pedro Pascal.
The impressive location, linked to the success of the series, helped Almeria continue the success that it had enjoyed through much of the last 50 years as a preferred destination for the filming of movies of different genres.
Locations, Landscapes, and Festivals
Almeria is a perfect destination for cinema tourism not only because of its landscapes but also because of the entire culture that has developed around it.
The more than 500 productions shot in Almeria have given rise to the creation of film festivals and exhibitions, making Almeria a favourite place to enjoy cinema tourism.
