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* ''Film/UnFlic'' is a downplayed Parisian example: instead of seeing the Eiffel Tower early on, we see the Arc de Triomphe late in the film. It's visible from Simon's hotel room.
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* In ''Film/{{Aline|2021}}'', when a young Aline Dieu (Creator/ValerieLemercier) goes to Paris for the first time, she poses at the Trocadéro with the Eiffel Tower in the background.
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* In the 1960 film ''Film/{{Austerlitz}}'', the Palace of Westminster, including St Stephen's Tower, is visible out of [[UsefulNotes/WilliamPittTheYounger Pitt's]] window. Unfortunately, it wasn't built until decades after the time the film is set.
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* In the 1960 film ''Film/{{Austerlitz}}'', the Palace of Westminster, including St Stephen's Tower, is visible out of [[UsefulNotes/WilliamPittTheYounger Pitt's]] window. Unfortunately, it wasn't built until decades after the time the film is set.
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* ''Film/JohnWickChapter4'' does this with all three of the cities heavily featured in the film:
** The opening shot of Paris is none other than the TropeNamer itself, the Eiffel Tower.
** Ōsaka is introduced with a shot of the Dōtonbori canal.
** Berlin is introduced with a shot of the Brandenburg Gate.
** The opening shot of Paris is none other than the TropeNamer itself, the Eiffel Tower.
** Ōsaka is introduced with a shot of the Dōtonbori canal.
** Berlin is introduced with a shot of the Brandenburg Gate.
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** The movies in general have used Big Ben far more than necessary.
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** The movies in general have used Big Ben far more than necessary.necessary for the UsefulNotes/{{London}} scenes.
** SPECTRE made sure its headquarters in UsefulNotes/{{Paris}} weren't too far from the Eiffel Tower.
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** In ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'', there is a shot of Bond's helicopter flying in front of the Taj Mahal, although Agra is not on the way to his destination. The director felt that he needed to insert a shot of the Taj Mahal because it was so beautiful, and they were in India anyway.
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** In ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'', there is a shot of Bond's helicopter flying in front of the Taj Mahal, although Agra is not on the way to his destination.destination (Udaipur, where the film is set and was filmed, is over 600 kilometers South-West from Agra). The director felt that he needed to insert a shot of the Taj Mahal because it was so beautiful, and they were in India anyway.
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* ''Film/TwelveMonkeys'' makes extensive use of the circa-'90s UsefulNotes/{{Philadelphia}} skyline, particularly the glass towers of Liberty Place.
* At the end of ''Film/TwoThousandTenTheYearWeMakeContact'' there's a montage showing the Lincoln Memorial, St. Basil's Cathedral, the Pyramids of Giza, the Eiffel Tower, Tower Bridge and the beach next to Heywood Floyd's house in Hawaii. [[spoiler:In every shot, there are two suns in the sky.]]
* In Creator/RolandEmmerich's ''Film/TwoThousandTwelve'', it's the end of time! What happens at "the end of time"? Famous landmarks get destroyed! Time, meanwhile, apparently continues to flow.
* ''Film/TwentyEightWeeksLater'' concludes with a scene of the "infected" running rampant in Paris. One guess as to how we're shown that it's Paris.
* ''Film/TheAdventuresOfPicasso'' combines this with the CaliforniaDoubling: a different landmark appears over the very same scenery to show which city the characters are in.
* ''{{Film/Argo}}'' uses the Azadi Tower in Tehran and the Hollywood sign with the latter shown in decrepit condition (anachronistically so, apparently for symbolic reasons; it had been restored the year before the story takes place).
* ''Film/Armageddon1998'' had the Eiffel Tower demolished.
* On one of the theatrical posters for ''Film/AroundTheWorldInEightyDays1956'', the Westminster clock tower and the Eiffel Tower are used as shorthand for London and Paris, despite the fact that the movie takes place in 1872 and the Eiffel Tower hadn't been built yet.
* In the 1960 film ''Film/{{Austerlitz}}'', the Palace of Westminster, including St Stephen's Tower, is visible out of [[UsefulNotes/WilliamPittTheYounger Pitt's]] window. Unfortunately, it wasn't built until decades after the time the film is set.
* In ''Film/TheAvengers1998'', Big Ben was completely demolished by the film-makers to demonstrate that the bad guy was really, truly evil.
* The City in ''Film/BabePigInTheCity'' is a massive parody of this. It contains every landmark mentioned on this page, all [[http://www.remotecentral.com/dvd/babe2-4.jpg within view of the same window]], and its streets are canals (as in [[CityOfCanals Venice, Italy]]).
* ''Film/BeingThere'' takes place in and around Washington, D.C., but the setting is only gradually revealed to the audience because the film is confined to Chance's townhouse for its opening section. He's never been outside it, and it's in a poorer section of the city, so we don't start seeing landmarks like the Washington Monument, the White House, and the Capitol Building until he's wandered well away from it. Prior to this, the only hint that Chance lived in Washington was an ad for the ''Washington Post'' on a television.
* ''Film/TheBrainStealers'' has an action scene in Tokyo, set on the Tokyo Tower's midsection (appropriately enough, the Tokyo Tower is based on the Eiffel Tower). The heroine Li Chiu-Lan managed to hurl a mook off the tower's side, before getting pushed off herself and ends up HangingByTheFingers until her partner saves her.
* ''Film/CamilleClaudel'', a biopic about the 19th century {{sculptor|s}}, puts an interesting spin on this. Camille leaves a doctor's office, distressed at having learned that she is pregnant. The camera pans up to show the Eiffel Tower behind her--still under construction, built up only to the second level.
* The 1945 film ''Film/CaptainKidd'' features the Tower Bridge in its establishing shot for a scene set in London -- even though the bridge wasn't built until nearly two centuries after Kidd died.
* In ''{{Film/Casablanca}}'', Rick's Paris flashback begins with a shot of...the Arc de Triomphe.
* Since ''Literature/AChristmasCarol'' was written before Westminster Palace, Tower Bridge, and the Clock Tower were built, most film adaptations use St. Paul's Cathedral to this effect, and the bells Scrooge hears on Christmas morning would be coming from there.
* In ''Film/{{Clegg}}'', the film establishes that Clegg and Cruikshank have travelled to Paris with a shit showing the pair of them with the Arc de Triomphe in the background.
* ''Film/{{Colette}}'' only uses one or two slightly less well-known Parisian landmarks (though it can’t resist mentioning the in-period debate about the trope namer structure), but the poster designer just ''had'' to include the Eiffel Tower.
* In ''Film/TheDarkKnight'' and before that ''Film/LaraCroftTombRaiderTheCradleOfLife'', the protagonist(s) leap off the Two-ifc in Hong Kong.
* In the film adaptation of ''Literature/TheDevilWearsPrada'', when Andy finally goes to Paris the Eiffel Tower is clearly visible out of the window in her suite.
* ''[[Film/{{Dhoom}} Dhoom 2]]'' wanted to be sure everyone knew the second half of the movie took place in Brazil, so they made a very big deal out of the Christ The Redeemer statue in Río de Janeiro. So much so that a scene in one of the songs took place there.
* In the UsefulNotes/{{Bollywood}} film ''Film/{{Don|TheChaseBeginsAgain}}'', most of the action occurs in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Every five minutes or so there is an establishing shot of the Petronas Towers so that we don't forget this, even when they come between scenes that occur miles away from the towers.
* ''Film/LaFamilleBelier'' gives a Parisian example: as soon as the family arrives in Paris, they encounter the Eiffel Tower.
* Averted in ''Film/{{Frantic}}'' where we don't catch a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower until the last part of the movie. In fact the protagonist is momentarily confused to see the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replicas_of_the_Statue_of_Liberty#Paris Statue of Liberty]].
* {{Parodied|Trope}} in ''Film/FrenchKiss'', in which the main character Kate says while in Canada that despite hating all things French, she ''does'' want to see the Eiffel Tower one time in her life. When in Paris, she keeps missing seeing the Tower because of silly contrivances (a bus blocks it, and so on). It isn't til she's leaving Paris that she sees the Tower, beaming after finally viewing it. It's never seen again in the film. (Played straight and/or lampshaded for the poster, which has the base of the Tower indistinctly in the background behind the leads.)
* ''Film/GIJoeTheRiseOfCobra'' had the bad guys take out the Eiffel Tower specifically for shock value to demonstrate [[KickTheDog how evil they were]].
* ''Film/HarryPotterAndThePhilosophersStone'' (Sorcerer’s Stone in the United States) used a brief shot of Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, and the River Thames to establish London before we cut to Harry and Hagrid arriving at the Leaky Cauldron.
* ''Film/HarryPotterAndTheHalfBloodPrince'' shows the Millennium Bridge being destroyed by Death Eaters. It also has a scene of Harry flying down the Thames, past Canary Wharf and the London Eye... despite the fact that this scene takes place in August 1996, when the Canary Wharf development (save only 1 Canada Square) and the London Eye hadn't been built yet.
* ''Film/HomeAlone1'': When everyone is in Rob and Georgette's apartment in Paris, the Eiffel Tower is in the background.
* ''Film/HomeAlone2LostInNewYork'': Kevin realizes that he didn't get on the plane to Miami when he looks out a window at the airport and sees the Manhattan skyline.
* The traditional icon for New York City was the Brooklyn Bridge (called, not unreasonably, the Manhattan Bridge by people in Brooklyn, which was not a part of NYC at the time). After the Twin Towers were completed in 1970 and 1972, they promptly became the new icon. Now that they are gone, the Brooklyn Bridge is back. ''Film/TheHotRock'', filmed in 1971, for good measure showed both icons.
* In ''Film/HudsonHawk'', the title character wakes up after being knocked out to find himself in Rome. He knows this because his hotel window just happens to face the Colosseum. Even better, when he then passes a door/window at a 90 degree angle with the first, he can still see the Colosseum.
* ''Film/{{Inception}}'' is a bit of a ShootTheMoney film, so we have SceneryPorn (and SceneryGorn) in the form of the streets of Paris exploding outwards in a beautiful manner, folding in on themselves like a taco and during the scene where Ariadne plays with the use of mirrors on the street, the Eiffel Tower is visible in the background.
* Various landmarks are shown in ''Film/IndependenceDay'' to indicate where some of the alien ships have parked.
* ''Franchise/IndianaJones'' series:
** When Indy leaves San Francisco in ''Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk'', his plane is shown flying over the Golden Gate Bridge. This is sometimes thought to be an anachronism because the film is set in 1936 and the Golden Gate Bridge didn't open until 1937. However, the bridge had been under construction since 1933 and we don't get a clear enough shot of the bridge to tell whether it's finished or not.
** During the TravelMontage in ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheTempleOfDoom'', the plane is shown flying over the Great Wall of China, but the route shown on the map takes it nowhere near the Great Wall.
** ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheLastCrusade'' uses the Petra ruins in Jordan as the entrance to the temple at the end. However, there is nothing apart from solid rock behind the façade in Petra, and the context in which it appears in the film would imply that the actual ruins do not exist in the movie's reality.
* ''Film/JamesBond'':
** The movies in general have used Big Ben far more than necessary.
** A more JustForFun/{{egregious}} example is in ''Film/{{Goldfinger}}'' where Felix's office has a clear view of the White House, even though the CIA's headquarters are in the suburb of Langley, Virginia.
** ''Film/TheManWithTheGoldenGun'' provides a temporary example by depicting the [=MI6=] Hong Kong office in the burnt out and capsized hulk of ''RMS Queen Elizabeth'', the former ocean liner that had been destroyed by arson in Hong Kong harbour the year before the film was released.
** The most JustForFun/{{egregious}} example is definitely ''Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe'' in which the Egyptian base of operations for [=MI6=] is located just inside the main entrance to the Temple of Ramesses II.
** In ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'', there is a shot of Bond's helicopter flying in front of the Taj Mahal, although Agra is not on the way to his destination. The director felt that he needed to insert a shot of the Taj Mahal because it was so beautiful, and they were in India anyway.
** Since the last third of ''Film/AViewToAKill'' takes place in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area, it's perhaps inevitable that the film climaxes over the Golden Gate Bridge. And earlier in that film, May Day leaps off the Eiffel Tower itself.
** When the plot of ''Film/{{Skyfall}}'' takes Bond to UsefulNotes/{{Shanghai}}, we see the standard establishing shot of the Lujiazui skyline reflecting on the Huangpu at night.
* ''Film/{{Justice|League 2017}} [[Film/ZackSnydersJusticeLeague League]]'': Wonder Woman's BatmanColdOpen shows her foiling a terrorist bombing in London. The EstablishingShot is Tower Bridge hung with a huge black flag with the Superman symbol, showing the worldwide mourning for the loss of their hero. The terrorists are shown driving across the bridge before carrying out their attack.
* Subverted in ''Film/TheKentuckyFriedMovie'''s in-universe spoof "A Fist full of Yen" which shows the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, then labels the shot "Hong Kong."
* ''Film/TheKillerThatStalkedNewYork'', a 1950 film {{Very Loosely Based|OnATrueStory}} on the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947_New_York_City_smallpox_outbreak 1947 New York City smallpox outbreak]], uses the Washington Monument, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower for the {{Establishing Shot}}s for Washington, D.C., London, and Paris, respectively.
* Parodied in ''Film/AKnightsTale'', in which the EstablishingShot of medieval London uses a wooden version of the London Eye as a distinctive landmark.
* As one of the rare non-Asian films set (even partially) in Taipei, ''Film/{{Lucy}}'' uses Taipei 101 generously in its establishing shots of the city. Later, the film moves to Paris, where during the climactic scene the title character transports herself to just outside the tower, giving us a pretty full view.
* ''Film/ManInTheAttic'' opens with a shot of Big Ben and the fog shrouded Thames River to establish the movie takes place in London.
* Non-urban example: In ''Film/MenInBlack3'', when Boris escapes from the lunar supermax prison, he steps out into the middle of Tranquility Base, instantly establishing that he's on ''our'' Moon rather than any of the other worlds presumably known to that Verse's [=MIB=]s.
* The Mosfilm biopic ''Mikhailo Lomonosov'' opens with a shot of a snowbound Peter and Paul Fortress to represent both St. Petersburg and Tsar Peter I "the Great" whose death opens the film.
* ''Film/TheMummyTrilogy'':
** ''Film/{{The Mummy|1999}}'': You can see the Pyramids from Thebes.
** ''Film/TheMummyReturns'' established clearly that the opening scene was set in London, by showing the Houses of Parliament, St Paul's Cathedral and Tower Bridge. All apparently next to each other.
* Both ''Film/NationalTreasure'' films did this in every single scene set in a major city. The Lincoln Memorial is the backdrop for a very serious discussion between Ben and Riley early on in the first film, apparently just so that they could get it in there. Fun fact: That scene was filmed on a day when the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was drained for maintenance. They digitally added the water back in, in post production.
* Early on in ''Ocho apellidos vascos'', the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giralda Giralda]] can be seen from Rafa's bedroom in Seville.
* In ''Film/OutOfThePast'', any exterior shot of San Francisco stars the Golden Gate Bridge.
* ''Film/PacificRim'': When the kaiju attacks Sydney, we see it break through the wall, which was apparently built right next to the Sydney Opera House, [[https://www.tumblr.com/alexanderpearce/706217299458342912 despite this requiring the wall to go deep into Botany Bay rather than just following the coast]].
* In the original ''Film/PlanetOfTheApes1968'', the movie ends with Taylor finding a demolished Statue of Liberty "You animals! You finally gone and done it!"
* Averted to great effect in Jacques Tati's film ''Playtime''. It's set in Paris, but the film is all about the alienation of the jet-set 1960s. The only times monuments like the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe are visible are when they're accidentally reflected in the glass doors of the hyper-modern, anonymous buildings the film's shot in. In a background gag, a travel agency has posters of places like Rome, New York, and Cairo. All of the posters show the same hyper-modern anonymous building.
* ''Film/TheReturnOfSherlockHolmes'' opens (and closes) with a shot of Big Ben to establish that the film is set in London (despite being shot in New York). No other London landmark is ever seen.
* The villain of ''Film/TheRocketeer'' (Creator/TimothyDalton) meets his end by crashing into the "HOLLYWOODLAND" sign, [[AlternateLandmarkHistory resulting in its present lettering]].
* ''Film/TheSentinel2006'' is about a Secret Service agent accused of being a mole, and as such there are lots of establishing shots of the White House and other Washington DC landmarks.
* ''The Sinking Of Japan'', particularly the 2006 remake, does this quite a bit. Flying volcanic rocks smash into ancient Japanese temples and the Tokyo Tower succumbs to the waves.
* The Trans America Pyramid appears in ''Film/TheSocialNetwork'' which would almost be a Shoutout to Fincher's ''Zodiac'' but Fincher says it was random stock footage they picked.
* Shown during the AvengersAssemble montage of ''Film/TheSoldier'', despite the fact that [[TitleIn Scene Shift Captions]] are used throughout the movie. The green fields of England and the French Alps somehow require establishing shots of the Palace of Westminister and the Eiffel Tower.
* ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog2020'':
** San Francisco is prominently represented by the Transamerica Pyramid, where Sonic's rings fall on top of, and a few background glimpses of the Golden Gate Bridge. One pre-redesign poster shows a first-person view of Sonic on one of the struts of the bridge, [[NeverTrustATrailer although he never actually comes near the bridge in the actual movie]].
** When Sonic and Robotnik warp to Egypt, Robotnik blows up the Great Sphinx and Sonic approaches and climbs atop the Great Pyramid of Giza.
** They also chase across the Great Wall of China briefly.
** When they go through France, the tower is visible but they don't actually go near it. In the animated credits sequence, Sonic spirals up the tower before entering the next ring, although it's colored like Tokyo Tower for some reason.
* The 2021 Irish film ''Spears'' has scenes set in London, Florence and Berlin - and lets you know it through use of the landmarks. Florence is coded with the Piazza della Signoria, London with The Shard and Berlin with the Tiergarten.
* Various parts of ''Film/SpiceWorld'' have the group riding around on their tour bus around numerous landmarks in London, as WebVideo/TheNostalgiaChick notes in her review of said movie, including a death-defying scene toward the end of the movie with Victoria Beckham trying to drive the bus over Tower Bridge, as it rises to allow a boat to pass through, so they could make it to their performance at the Royal Albert Hall. (This may be a reference to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Buses_route_78 a real-life incident from 1952]], in which a bus jumped Tower Bridge just after it had started to rise.)
* All sorts of science fiction movies have destroyed the Golden Gate Bridge as an avatar for San Francisco. In reality, crossing the bridge north from the city doesn't really go anywhere other than some ritzy bedroom communities and the sticks further north. Destroying the Bay Bridge, on the other hand, would put a serious wound in the city's infrastructure and many people's commutes, but [[RuleOfCool the Golden Gate is a much prettier and more instantly-recognizable bridge]]. Averted as a very brief joke in ''Film/StarTrek2009'', where [[spoiler: Spock shoots Nero's drill down when it's drilling into Earth, just above Starfleet Academy in San Francisco. The drill breaks up and part of it falls down...''just'' to the right of the Golden Gate Bridge and into the water]]. And then it nearly gets destroyed ''again'' in [[Film/StarTrekIntoDarkness the next movie]]. Alcatraz, however, is not spared.
* The retooled cut of ''Film/SupermanII'' has terrorists planting a bomb on the Eiffel Tower. Notably, the French police are rather blasé about it exploding.
* Attempted (badly) in ''Film/TakingLives''. The film is set in Montreal, but has numerous lingering shots of the Chateau Frontenac...which is in Quebec City.
* Parodied (hard) in ''Film/TeamAmericaWorldPolice''. Each set is an elaborate miniature of the most visible landmarks in the city (Paris, Panama, etc.), placing them all in the space of a few blocks...and then destroying them, much to the consternation of the people who live there.
* Averted in ''Film/ThorTheDarkWorld'' -- though much of the action takes place in London, we never see Westminister Palace (home of "Big Ben"), Tower Bridge, or Buckingham Palace. The only landmarks on display are the Greenwich naval college building, and the gherkin-shaped 30 St. Mary Axe tower.
* ''Film/{{Trainspotting}}'' introduces a sequence set in London with a quickfire montage featuring Big Ben, Tower Bridge, Trafalgar Square and Canary Wharf.
* The ''Film/TransformersFilmSeries'' is quite notorious for this by now. In the first film, we had the Hoover Dam, and Starscream partially destroyed one of its water towers. In the second, the Great Pyramids of Giza are ''directly'' across from the Rose Red City of Petra (what happened to Israel in-between?). Michael Bay was pretty happy about being allowed to film at both locations.
* Played for laughs in ''Film/UnderSiege2DarkTerritory''. The BigBad makes his threat video using a fake backdrop of the Eiffel Tower and playing French music in the background (he was on a train the whole time). When the government agents are coming up with ways to catch him, one feebly suggests searching Paris.
* ''Film/VanHelsing'' begins with an opening shot of Paris. Interestingly, the movie is set in 1888, and the movie [[ShownTheirWork shows it as incomplete]].
* It's a little hard to make out since it's so far away, but in ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' the Hollywood Sign is visible from Eddie's office window.
* ''Film/XMenFilmSeries''
** ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'': The iconic landmark is used in the EstablishingShot of Paris.
** ''Film/XMenApocalypse'': The Giza pyramids are in the background in the wide shot of Cairo. There is also the Sydney Opera House.
* ''Film/{{Zodiac|2007}}'' uses a number of icons to show San Francisco, the Ferry Building, the Transamerica pyramid is shown frequently, though it's still under construction, Melvin Belli's St. Francis Wood mansion is shown to have a close view of Downtown San Francisco. In reality, the neighborhood is miles from Downtown and the view is obscured by hills.
* At the end of ''Film/TwoThousandTenTheYearWeMakeContact'' there's a montage showing the Lincoln Memorial, St. Basil's Cathedral, the Pyramids of Giza, the Eiffel Tower, Tower Bridge and the beach next to Heywood Floyd's house in Hawaii. [[spoiler:In every shot, there are two suns in the sky.]]
* In Creator/RolandEmmerich's ''Film/TwoThousandTwelve'', it's the end of time! What happens at "the end of time"? Famous landmarks get destroyed! Time, meanwhile, apparently continues to flow.
* ''Film/TwentyEightWeeksLater'' concludes with a scene of the "infected" running rampant in Paris. One guess as to how we're shown that it's Paris.
* ''Film/TheAdventuresOfPicasso'' combines this with the CaliforniaDoubling: a different landmark appears over the very same scenery to show which city the characters are in.
* ''{{Film/Argo}}'' uses the Azadi Tower in Tehran and the Hollywood sign with the latter shown in decrepit condition (anachronistically so, apparently for symbolic reasons; it had been restored the year before the story takes place).
* ''Film/Armageddon1998'' had the Eiffel Tower demolished.
* On one of the theatrical posters for ''Film/AroundTheWorldInEightyDays1956'', the Westminster clock tower and the Eiffel Tower are used as shorthand for London and Paris, despite the fact that the movie takes place in 1872 and the Eiffel Tower hadn't been built yet.
* In the 1960 film ''Film/{{Austerlitz}}'', the Palace of Westminster, including St Stephen's Tower, is visible out of [[UsefulNotes/WilliamPittTheYounger Pitt's]] window. Unfortunately, it wasn't built until decades after the time the film is set.
* In ''Film/TheAvengers1998'', Big Ben was completely demolished by the film-makers to demonstrate that the bad guy was really, truly evil.
* The City in ''Film/BabePigInTheCity'' is a massive parody of this. It contains every landmark mentioned on this page, all [[http://www.remotecentral.com/dvd/babe2-4.jpg within view of the same window]], and its streets are canals (as in [[CityOfCanals Venice, Italy]]).
* ''Film/BeingThere'' takes place in and around Washington, D.C., but the setting is only gradually revealed to the audience because the film is confined to Chance's townhouse for its opening section. He's never been outside it, and it's in a poorer section of the city, so we don't start seeing landmarks like the Washington Monument, the White House, and the Capitol Building until he's wandered well away from it. Prior to this, the only hint that Chance lived in Washington was an ad for the ''Washington Post'' on a television.
* ''Film/TheBrainStealers'' has an action scene in Tokyo, set on the Tokyo Tower's midsection (appropriately enough, the Tokyo Tower is based on the Eiffel Tower). The heroine Li Chiu-Lan managed to hurl a mook off the tower's side, before getting pushed off herself and ends up HangingByTheFingers until her partner saves her.
* ''Film/CamilleClaudel'', a biopic about the 19th century {{sculptor|s}}, puts an interesting spin on this. Camille leaves a doctor's office, distressed at having learned that she is pregnant. The camera pans up to show the Eiffel Tower behind her--still under construction, built up only to the second level.
* The 1945 film ''Film/CaptainKidd'' features the Tower Bridge in its establishing shot for a scene set in London -- even though the bridge wasn't built until nearly two centuries after Kidd died.
* In ''{{Film/Casablanca}}'', Rick's Paris flashback begins with a shot of...the Arc de Triomphe.
* Since ''Literature/AChristmasCarol'' was written before Westminster Palace, Tower Bridge, and the Clock Tower were built, most film adaptations use St. Paul's Cathedral to this effect, and the bells Scrooge hears on Christmas morning would be coming from there.
* In ''Film/{{Clegg}}'', the film establishes that Clegg and Cruikshank have travelled to Paris with a shit showing the pair of them with the Arc de Triomphe in the background.
* ''Film/{{Colette}}'' only uses one or two slightly less well-known Parisian landmarks (though it can’t resist mentioning the in-period debate about the trope namer structure), but the poster designer just ''had'' to include the Eiffel Tower.
* In ''Film/TheDarkKnight'' and before that ''Film/LaraCroftTombRaiderTheCradleOfLife'', the protagonist(s) leap off the Two-ifc in Hong Kong.
* In the film adaptation of ''Literature/TheDevilWearsPrada'', when Andy finally goes to Paris the Eiffel Tower is clearly visible out of the window in her suite.
* ''[[Film/{{Dhoom}} Dhoom 2]]'' wanted to be sure everyone knew the second half of the movie took place in Brazil, so they made a very big deal out of the Christ The Redeemer statue in Río de Janeiro. So much so that a scene in one of the songs took place there.
* In the UsefulNotes/{{Bollywood}} film ''Film/{{Don|TheChaseBeginsAgain}}'', most of the action occurs in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Every five minutes or so there is an establishing shot of the Petronas Towers so that we don't forget this, even when they come between scenes that occur miles away from the towers.
* ''Film/LaFamilleBelier'' gives a Parisian example: as soon as the family arrives in Paris, they encounter the Eiffel Tower.
* Averted in ''Film/{{Frantic}}'' where we don't catch a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower until the last part of the movie. In fact the protagonist is momentarily confused to see the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replicas_of_the_Statue_of_Liberty#Paris Statue of Liberty]].
* {{Parodied|Trope}} in ''Film/FrenchKiss'', in which the main character Kate says while in Canada that despite hating all things French, she ''does'' want to see the Eiffel Tower one time in her life. When in Paris, she keeps missing seeing the Tower because of silly contrivances (a bus blocks it, and so on). It isn't til she's leaving Paris that she sees the Tower, beaming after finally viewing it. It's never seen again in the film. (Played straight and/or lampshaded for the poster, which has the base of the Tower indistinctly in the background behind the leads.)
* ''Film/GIJoeTheRiseOfCobra'' had the bad guys take out the Eiffel Tower specifically for shock value to demonstrate [[KickTheDog how evil they were]].
* ''Film/HarryPotterAndThePhilosophersStone'' (Sorcerer’s Stone in the United States) used a brief shot of Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, and the River Thames to establish London before we cut to Harry and Hagrid arriving at the Leaky Cauldron.
* ''Film/HarryPotterAndTheHalfBloodPrince'' shows the Millennium Bridge being destroyed by Death Eaters. It also has a scene of Harry flying down the Thames, past Canary Wharf and the London Eye... despite the fact that this scene takes place in August 1996, when the Canary Wharf development (save only 1 Canada Square) and the London Eye hadn't been built yet.
* ''Film/HomeAlone1'': When everyone is in Rob and Georgette's apartment in Paris, the Eiffel Tower is in the background.
* ''Film/HomeAlone2LostInNewYork'': Kevin realizes that he didn't get on the plane to Miami when he looks out a window at the airport and sees the Manhattan skyline.
* The traditional icon for New York City was the Brooklyn Bridge (called, not unreasonably, the Manhattan Bridge by people in Brooklyn, which was not a part of NYC at the time). After the Twin Towers were completed in 1970 and 1972, they promptly became the new icon. Now that they are gone, the Brooklyn Bridge is back. ''Film/TheHotRock'', filmed in 1971, for good measure showed both icons.
* In ''Film/HudsonHawk'', the title character wakes up after being knocked out to find himself in Rome. He knows this because his hotel window just happens to face the Colosseum. Even better, when he then passes a door/window at a 90 degree angle with the first, he can still see the Colosseum.
* ''Film/{{Inception}}'' is a bit of a ShootTheMoney film, so we have SceneryPorn (and SceneryGorn) in the form of the streets of Paris exploding outwards in a beautiful manner, folding in on themselves like a taco and during the scene where Ariadne plays with the use of mirrors on the street, the Eiffel Tower is visible in the background.
* Various landmarks are shown in ''Film/IndependenceDay'' to indicate where some of the alien ships have parked.
* ''Franchise/IndianaJones'' series:
** When Indy leaves San Francisco in ''Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk'', his plane is shown flying over the Golden Gate Bridge. This is sometimes thought to be an anachronism because the film is set in 1936 and the Golden Gate Bridge didn't open until 1937. However, the bridge had been under construction since 1933 and we don't get a clear enough shot of the bridge to tell whether it's finished or not.
** During the TravelMontage in ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheTempleOfDoom'', the plane is shown flying over the Great Wall of China, but the route shown on the map takes it nowhere near the Great Wall.
** ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheLastCrusade'' uses the Petra ruins in Jordan as the entrance to the temple at the end. However, there is nothing apart from solid rock behind the façade in Petra, and the context in which it appears in the film would imply that the actual ruins do not exist in the movie's reality.
* ''Film/JamesBond'':
** The movies in general have used Big Ben far more than necessary.
** A more JustForFun/{{egregious}} example is in ''Film/{{Goldfinger}}'' where Felix's office has a clear view of the White House, even though the CIA's headquarters are in the suburb of Langley, Virginia.
** ''Film/TheManWithTheGoldenGun'' provides a temporary example by depicting the [=MI6=] Hong Kong office in the burnt out and capsized hulk of ''RMS Queen Elizabeth'', the former ocean liner that had been destroyed by arson in Hong Kong harbour the year before the film was released.
** The most JustForFun/{{egregious}} example is definitely ''Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe'' in which the Egyptian base of operations for [=MI6=] is located just inside the main entrance to the Temple of Ramesses II.
** In ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'', there is a shot of Bond's helicopter flying in front of the Taj Mahal, although Agra is not on the way to his destination. The director felt that he needed to insert a shot of the Taj Mahal because it was so beautiful, and they were in India anyway.
** Since the last third of ''Film/AViewToAKill'' takes place in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area, it's perhaps inevitable that the film climaxes over the Golden Gate Bridge. And earlier in that film, May Day leaps off the Eiffel Tower itself.
** When the plot of ''Film/{{Skyfall}}'' takes Bond to UsefulNotes/{{Shanghai}}, we see the standard establishing shot of the Lujiazui skyline reflecting on the Huangpu at night.
* ''Film/{{Justice|League 2017}} [[Film/ZackSnydersJusticeLeague League]]'': Wonder Woman's BatmanColdOpen shows her foiling a terrorist bombing in London. The EstablishingShot is Tower Bridge hung with a huge black flag with the Superman symbol, showing the worldwide mourning for the loss of their hero. The terrorists are shown driving across the bridge before carrying out their attack.
* Subverted in ''Film/TheKentuckyFriedMovie'''s in-universe spoof "A Fist full of Yen" which shows the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, then labels the shot "Hong Kong."
* ''Film/TheKillerThatStalkedNewYork'', a 1950 film {{Very Loosely Based|OnATrueStory}} on the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947_New_York_City_smallpox_outbreak 1947 New York City smallpox outbreak]], uses the Washington Monument, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower for the {{Establishing Shot}}s for Washington, D.C., London, and Paris, respectively.
* Parodied in ''Film/AKnightsTale'', in which the EstablishingShot of medieval London uses a wooden version of the London Eye as a distinctive landmark.
* As one of the rare non-Asian films set (even partially) in Taipei, ''Film/{{Lucy}}'' uses Taipei 101 generously in its establishing shots of the city. Later, the film moves to Paris, where during the climactic scene the title character transports herself to just outside the tower, giving us a pretty full view.
* ''Film/ManInTheAttic'' opens with a shot of Big Ben and the fog shrouded Thames River to establish the movie takes place in London.
* Non-urban example: In ''Film/MenInBlack3'', when Boris escapes from the lunar supermax prison, he steps out into the middle of Tranquility Base, instantly establishing that he's on ''our'' Moon rather than any of the other worlds presumably known to that Verse's [=MIB=]s.
* The Mosfilm biopic ''Mikhailo Lomonosov'' opens with a shot of a snowbound Peter and Paul Fortress to represent both St. Petersburg and Tsar Peter I "the Great" whose death opens the film.
* ''Film/TheMummyTrilogy'':
** ''Film/{{The Mummy|1999}}'': You can see the Pyramids from Thebes.
** ''Film/TheMummyReturns'' established clearly that the opening scene was set in London, by showing the Houses of Parliament, St Paul's Cathedral and Tower Bridge. All apparently next to each other.
* Both ''Film/NationalTreasure'' films did this in every single scene set in a major city. The Lincoln Memorial is the backdrop for a very serious discussion between Ben and Riley early on in the first film, apparently just so that they could get it in there. Fun fact: That scene was filmed on a day when the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was drained for maintenance. They digitally added the water back in, in post production.
* Early on in ''Ocho apellidos vascos'', the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giralda Giralda]] can be seen from Rafa's bedroom in Seville.
* In ''Film/OutOfThePast'', any exterior shot of San Francisco stars the Golden Gate Bridge.
* ''Film/PacificRim'': When the kaiju attacks Sydney, we see it break through the wall, which was apparently built right next to the Sydney Opera House, [[https://www.tumblr.com/alexanderpearce/706217299458342912 despite this requiring the wall to go deep into Botany Bay rather than just following the coast]].
* In the original ''Film/PlanetOfTheApes1968'', the movie ends with Taylor finding a demolished Statue of Liberty "You animals! You finally gone and done it!"
* Averted to great effect in Jacques Tati's film ''Playtime''. It's set in Paris, but the film is all about the alienation of the jet-set 1960s. The only times monuments like the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe are visible are when they're accidentally reflected in the glass doors of the hyper-modern, anonymous buildings the film's shot in. In a background gag, a travel agency has posters of places like Rome, New York, and Cairo. All of the posters show the same hyper-modern anonymous building.
* ''Film/TheReturnOfSherlockHolmes'' opens (and closes) with a shot of Big Ben to establish that the film is set in London (despite being shot in New York). No other London landmark is ever seen.
* The villain of ''Film/TheRocketeer'' (Creator/TimothyDalton) meets his end by crashing into the "HOLLYWOODLAND" sign, [[AlternateLandmarkHistory resulting in its present lettering]].
* ''Film/TheSentinel2006'' is about a Secret Service agent accused of being a mole, and as such there are lots of establishing shots of the White House and other Washington DC landmarks.
* ''The Sinking Of Japan'', particularly the 2006 remake, does this quite a bit. Flying volcanic rocks smash into ancient Japanese temples and the Tokyo Tower succumbs to the waves.
* The Trans America Pyramid appears in ''Film/TheSocialNetwork'' which would almost be a Shoutout to Fincher's ''Zodiac'' but Fincher says it was random stock footage they picked.
* Shown during the AvengersAssemble montage of ''Film/TheSoldier'', despite the fact that [[TitleIn Scene Shift Captions]] are used throughout the movie. The green fields of England and the French Alps somehow require establishing shots of the Palace of Westminister and the Eiffel Tower.
* ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog2020'':
** San Francisco is prominently represented by the Transamerica Pyramid, where Sonic's rings fall on top of, and a few background glimpses of the Golden Gate Bridge. One pre-redesign poster shows a first-person view of Sonic on one of the struts of the bridge, [[NeverTrustATrailer although he never actually comes near the bridge in the actual movie]].
** When Sonic and Robotnik warp to Egypt, Robotnik blows up the Great Sphinx and Sonic approaches and climbs atop the Great Pyramid of Giza.
** They also chase across the Great Wall of China briefly.
** When they go through France, the tower is visible but they don't actually go near it. In the animated credits sequence, Sonic spirals up the tower before entering the next ring, although it's colored like Tokyo Tower for some reason.
* The 2021 Irish film ''Spears'' has scenes set in London, Florence and Berlin - and lets you know it through use of the landmarks. Florence is coded with the Piazza della Signoria, London with The Shard and Berlin with the Tiergarten.
* Various parts of ''Film/SpiceWorld'' have the group riding around on their tour bus around numerous landmarks in London, as WebVideo/TheNostalgiaChick notes in her review of said movie, including a death-defying scene toward the end of the movie with Victoria Beckham trying to drive the bus over Tower Bridge, as it rises to allow a boat to pass through, so they could make it to their performance at the Royal Albert Hall. (This may be a reference to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Buses_route_78 a real-life incident from 1952]], in which a bus jumped Tower Bridge just after it had started to rise.)
* All sorts of science fiction movies have destroyed the Golden Gate Bridge as an avatar for San Francisco. In reality, crossing the bridge north from the city doesn't really go anywhere other than some ritzy bedroom communities and the sticks further north. Destroying the Bay Bridge, on the other hand, would put a serious wound in the city's infrastructure and many people's commutes, but [[RuleOfCool the Golden Gate is a much prettier and more instantly-recognizable bridge]]. Averted as a very brief joke in ''Film/StarTrek2009'', where [[spoiler: Spock shoots Nero's drill down when it's drilling into Earth, just above Starfleet Academy in San Francisco. The drill breaks up and part of it falls down...''just'' to the right of the Golden Gate Bridge and into the water]]. And then it nearly gets destroyed ''again'' in [[Film/StarTrekIntoDarkness the next movie]]. Alcatraz, however, is not spared.
* The retooled cut of ''Film/SupermanII'' has terrorists planting a bomb on the Eiffel Tower. Notably, the French police are rather blasé about it exploding.
* Attempted (badly) in ''Film/TakingLives''. The film is set in Montreal, but has numerous lingering shots of the Chateau Frontenac...which is in Quebec City.
* Parodied (hard) in ''Film/TeamAmericaWorldPolice''. Each set is an elaborate miniature of the most visible landmarks in the city (Paris, Panama, etc.), placing them all in the space of a few blocks...and then destroying them, much to the consternation of the people who live there.
* Averted in ''Film/ThorTheDarkWorld'' -- though much of the action takes place in London, we never see Westminister Palace (home of "Big Ben"), Tower Bridge, or Buckingham Palace. The only landmarks on display are the Greenwich naval college building, and the gherkin-shaped 30 St. Mary Axe tower.
* ''Film/{{Trainspotting}}'' introduces a sequence set in London with a quickfire montage featuring Big Ben, Tower Bridge, Trafalgar Square and Canary Wharf.
* The ''Film/TransformersFilmSeries'' is quite notorious for this by now. In the first film, we had the Hoover Dam, and Starscream partially destroyed one of its water towers. In the second, the Great Pyramids of Giza are ''directly'' across from the Rose Red City of Petra (what happened to Israel in-between?). Michael Bay was pretty happy about being allowed to film at both locations.
* Played for laughs in ''Film/UnderSiege2DarkTerritory''. The BigBad makes his threat video using a fake backdrop of the Eiffel Tower and playing French music in the background (he was on a train the whole time). When the government agents are coming up with ways to catch him, one feebly suggests searching Paris.
* ''Film/VanHelsing'' begins with an opening shot of Paris. Interestingly, the movie is set in 1888, and the movie [[ShownTheirWork shows it as incomplete]].
* It's a little hard to make out since it's so far away, but in ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' the Hollywood Sign is visible from Eddie's office window.
* ''Film/XMenFilmSeries''
** ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'': The iconic landmark is used in the EstablishingShot of Paris.
** ''Film/XMenApocalypse'': The Giza pyramids are in the background in the wide shot of Cairo. There is also the Sydney Opera House.
* ''Film/{{Zodiac|2007}}'' uses a number of icons to show San Francisco, the Ferry Building, the Transamerica pyramid is shown frequently, though it's still under construction, Melvin Belli's St. Francis Wood mansion is shown to have a close view of Downtown San Francisco. In reality, the neighborhood is miles from Downtown and the view is obscured by hills.
