The Earthly Locations of Interstellar.
By Erik Nachtrieb, SetJetters CEO & CoFounder
The movie Interstellar was entirely filmed on the planet Earth, which is not surprising especially when even Tom Cruise hasn’t figured out how to film in outer-space yet.
So until blasting a film crew into space becomes feasible, science fiction filmmakers still have the creative job of figuring out how to make locations on earth look and feel otherworldly.
And that’s why science fiction are some of our favorite films to SetJet. Movies like Interstellar highlight parts of our planet that are truly incredible and often overlooked by the standard tour guides. Let’s take a look at some of the earth-bound locations from the movie Interstellar.
The Cooper family farm and house were supposed to be located in Colorado, USA. If we can judge by the drive Coop and Murph took to the NORAD underground bunker (the “new” NASA headquarters), the farm was less than a single day’s drive away, placing them somewhere in the corn country of eastern Colorado.
However, the Cooper farm was actually filmed in Canada, near Pekisko, Alberta where they planted 202 hectares (500 acres) of corn around a prop-shell farmhouse to be authentic and avoid CGI (a well-known hallmark of Nolan films). The house was dismantled after production and the corn field was harvested and sold by the production! The field remains at the location as well as the spot where the farmhouse stood, which is on private property.
Before we head to our first intergalactic planet, we should discuss the location of the black hole known as Gargantua. It was definitely CGI in the film, but this feature really does exist, discovered at the center of our Milky Way galaxy. Coop and his team traversed beyond our galaxy via the wormhole to arrive at our first intergalactic stop of Miller’s planet, the closest planet to Gargantua.
Miller’s planet was actually filmed between the North Atlantic and Vatnajökull Glacier in the Jökulsárlón lagoon, dotted with icebergs resulting from the outflow of the glacier. Again, Nolan wanted authenticity and the glacial lagoon provided real water that was shallow and calm enough in the “outwash plain” in which to film (this same water body also happens to be the deepest lake in Iceland at 284 meters (932 feet)). The lake has also been featured in two James Bond movies, A View to a Kill and Die Another Day, as well as Batman Begins and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.
Getting farther away from Gargantua, we arrive at Dr. Mann’s ice planet, made of ammonia ice with and icy atmosphere and deceivingly solid clouds. Coop and the team land here to check on Dr. Mann and set up a base on a potentially habitable planet, but with ammonia’s freezing temperature of -77.73°C (107.9°F), they’re out of luck.
The filming location for Dr. Mann’s planet was Svínafellsjökull Glacier in Iceland. As you can see from the photo, it’s an ideal setting! They booked the whole glacier right at the height of the climbing season, closing down the approach trails and they had to build their own road to drive vehicles onto the glacier - and even brought the full scale spacecraft model.
There’s a reason Christopher Nolan’s films are epic and expansive; he grows his own corn, builds roads, and climbs glaciers in the goal to transform the authentic beauty of our world into otherworldly movie locations you can now visit and explore.
Find all of the Interstellar locations on the SetJetters movie scene location mobile app and share your visits with the SetJetters community.
SetJetters is the app that puts film locations in the palm of your hand.
Download for free on Android or Apple stores, and we look forward to seeing your photos from your favorite movie locations.
