11
votes

While on a motorbiking trip across America in 2012, we had the good fortune to be taken to visit a movie set. We were not allowed onto the set itself as they were due to start filming soon after we left, but I took this photo from the end of the set:

movie set

  • This photo was taken on 5th October 2012 around 9am.
  • The location is in New Mexico, close to Santa Fe. We left Santa Fe that morning and rode for around 30-40 minutes to get there I think.
  • There was supposedly a well-known actor in the film (not necessarily an A-lister, but someone a lot of people would have heard of or seen in other movies).
  • There are two visible signs in the photo: one on the second building on the right saying "Denver Mining Supply Company / Fuses-Powder-Tools / Established 1859" and the one on the far back left saying "___ary Feed / Sale Exchange Stable".

At the time someone did tell me what the name of the movie was, but I cannot remember at all. I've checked through the list of Westerns released in 2013/14 but didn't see anything recognisable.

Is there a way to search movies based on when and/or where they were filmed? Does anyone recognise the set?

5
  • IMDb has a section for filming locations in each movie listing. I would start there. Was this a set or a ghost town turned into a set? What is the name of the location?
    – sanpaco
    Commented Mar 25, 2016 at 21:21
  • This might not be easy. The Western genre is still surprisingly popular, and this looks like a very generic set. We could possibly narrow this down to like 5 films, but they'll still be guesses.
    – Walt
    Commented Mar 25, 2016 at 22:06
  • 1
    Using the IMDB advanced title search, I can see that there are 7 theatrical or TV films that are westerns, English language, release in 2013 or 2014, and filmed in New Mexico. Without more info, or someone recognizing the fairly generic set, there isn't much more to go off of though. Also, are you sure it was a movie? There seems to have been a few western TV shows at the time.
    – Thunderforge
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 3:36
  • @Thunderforge Yup. The last 2 don't seem to have a recognizable star. Lone Ranger seems too big to forget. A Million Ways was primarily shot in Santa Fe, but was only announced in Dec 2012. Frontera takes place in modern times. That leaves us with Homesman and Sweetwater, and my money's on the latter (town design there has some blue tones, like that balcony). But this is mainly just based on deductive reasoning.
    – Walt
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 8:34
  • @sanpaco Pretty sure it was a purpose-built set. I don't have a name for the location.
    – DisgruntledGoat
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 21:47

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4
votes

Thanks to the research by the commenters above, I am sure the location must be the "Bonanza Creek Ranch". Looking at the location on Google Maps it fits with where we were shortly before and afterwards. Doing a new search, there are 3 films within the time frame:

I saw this in the trailer for Sweetwater, which looks like the set from the opposite end of my photo:

sweetwater

The balcony on the far building looks different, but this is the only one of the three that has famous actors in it, and it seems the best fit for dates. I'll check it out if I can.

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