Movies filmed in NC

With the upcoming release of Nights in Rodanthe (IMDB), a film based on the book by Nicholas Sparks and set in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I’ve been curious about other movies that were filmed in the Tar Heel state. Thankfully, we’ve got a copy of The North Carolina Filmography by Jenny Henderson here in the library, an index with over 2,000 listings of films all or partially shot in North Carolina.

Some larger name films that were partially shot in NC include:

North Carolina Filmography cover

  • Hannibal
  • Patch Adams
  • Nell
  • Forrest Gump
  • The Fugitive
  • Last of the Mohicans
  • Mr. Destiny
  • Dirty Dancing
  • Bull Durham
  • Days of Thunder
  • The Swan
  • Shallow Hal
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

To my delight, I also stumbled on a few films in the index you may not have heard of, including:

  • Hot Summer in Barefoot County (1974, Charlotte)
  • Pitch a Boogie Woogie (1947, Greenville)
  • Somebody Moved My Mountain (1974, Asheville, Winston-Salem)
  • Cannibal Vampire Schoolgirls (1995, Wilmington)
  • Alien Outlaw (1986, Kernersville)
  • A Child of the Wild (1917, Hendersonville)

12 thoughts on “Movies filmed in NC”

  1. I noticed “Pitch a Boogie Woogie” on the list, and thought I would share this from the Guide to the John Warner Papers held by East Carolina University:

    “Pitch a Boogie Woogie,” released by Lord-Warner Pictures, Inc., in 1948, was the first movie made by a production company based in North Carolina. The film, which had an all-black cast of mostly local Greenville, N.C., performers, enjoyed success in the Carolinas, but was never shown outside that area. Lord-Warner dissolved in 1949 and John Warner went to work for a local TV station. His brother William Lord, who changed his name from Warner in the 1920s, returned to New York.”

    East Carolina’s library also has a postcard scanned and online that was used to promote the film, apparently: http://media.lib.ecu.edu/spclcoll/staffpick.cfm?id=115

    In 1986, ECU professor Alex Albright rediscovered the film, and it was given national exposure.

  2. I watched Last of the Mohicans when I was a kid and I still can’t get out of my
    head how beautiful it was. I always wondered where that was filmed. Now I have to visit. I didn’t know about the Fugitive either. Thanks.

  3. After scouring the nation for an old-growth forest that would double as upstate New York in 1757, the director of “Mohicans” settled on the site on Lake James — where most trees were no more than 30 years old. Crescent Resources, a Duke Power subsidiary, had clear-cut and replanted pines.

  4. I remember hearing information about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles being filmed in NC. A lot more movies should shoot in NC, beautiful piedmont and mountains.

  5. There is a movie being made just outside of Hickory, NC in the small town of Hildebran. Does anyone have any info on this movie?

  6. High Point, NC – I was on the crew – House of Cards with Kathleen Turner and Tommy Lee Jones. 1992

  7. I’m looking for the name of a movie that was made in Julian N.C. (or at least used in a scene using a local diner) the name of the diner was changed to Milo’s Place. Some say Dustin Hoffman was in this movie. Can anyone please help? Thanks.

  8. Maybe “Billy Bathgate” (1991)? Hoffman played a gangster, and a lot of it was filmed in a retrofitted Hamlet….

  9. Anyone know of a movie, Tiger Eyes, filmed partially in the Outer Banks. This movie is not the more recent Tiger Eyes movie. The Tiger Eyes movie I am talking about is shot in the late 1960s/early 1970s.

  10. Does anyone know of a movie that has a restaurant
    named “Milo’s Place” in it?

    This scene was filmed on Liberty Rd. in Julian,N.C.
    around mid 1990’s I’m guessing.

  11. Friend looking for the exact location in Hendersonville NC of the film TAINTED I believe he said in the 80s
    Thanks in advance

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