by Scott Laird
Last updated: 10:00 AM ET, Sun May 13, 2018
Film crews love Hawai'i, and lovers of film visiting Hawai'i have no shortage of famous film locations to explore during their visit. With this in mind, the St. Regis Princeville has taken advantage of the Island of Kaua'i's popularity with film crews and is offering guests an exclusive tour of the island's most famous movie locales.
The resort is no stranger to stardom, having itself featured prominently in 2011's The Descendants, starring George Clooney. Visitors to the hotel may also recognize the iconic view of Hanalei Bay from the 1958 movie musical South Pacific. It's been almost 25 years since the original Jurassic Parkwas filmed in theatres, and much of the principal photography took place on the Garden Isle, including the iconic helicopter arrival scene next to the waterfall.
Manawaiopuna Falls sits on private land and is otherwise inaccessible to the public, but the tour offered by the resort includes a private helicopter charter to the site, in addition to an ATV journey to visit the sites of a diverse slate of films including Raiders of the Lost Ark and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. Rates for the exclusive package tour (without room accommodations) start at $5674 plus tax for two adults and include private air and ground tours, transfers, and luncheon. Guests can also book a four-night stay in the St. Regis Presidential Suite, which served as the set of The Descendants, for $14,700 plus tax.
Visitors wanting to self-tour film sites on Kaua'i can check out Black Pot Beach, Tunnels Beach, and Lumahai Beach, all of which featured prominently in South Pacific, and Lihue Airport, which was seen in both The Descendants and Six Days, Seven Nights. Fans of the television program Fantasy Island will recognize Wailua Falls from the opening credits, and Elvis lovers will recognize several spots on the Coconut Coast, from Wailua River to Lydgate State Park from the film Blue Hawai'i.
O'ahu is the other primary film location in the Hawaiian Islands, and is the undisputed champion in television production. Both the original 1968 series Hawaii Five-O and it's 2010 reboot film on O'ahu, as well as series like Magnum P.I. and Lost. Lost most notably had sites throughout O'ahu stand-in for locales as diverse as Sydney, South Korea, Iowa, and New York City. Various outfitters on O'ahu offer custom tours to view film and television sets across the island.
A number of films were filmed on the Windward side of O'ahu on the Kualoa Ranch property, which is private land but also offers guided tours of the film sites for Jurassic Park, Lost, and 50 First Dates. Another favorite is Punch Drunk Love where a scene filmed at the Royal Hawaiian serves as the movie poster, while Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates was shot almost entirely on location at Turtle Bay Resort.
For World War II buffs, films depicting the Pacific theatre were often shot on O'ahu, which has long been a major military base. Scenes in From Here to Eternity, Tora! Tora! Tora! and Pearl Harbor were all shot in and around the island's military installations. O'ahu's north shore was also the film site for Hawaii, the 1966 adaptation of a portion of the epic novel by James Michener, starring Julie Andrews. The Hawaiians, based on later chapters of the same book, was filmed on O'ahu and Kaua'i.
Exit to Eden, a 1993 film starring Rosie O'Donnell was filmed on Lana'i at a resort that has since been extensively remodeled into the Four Seasons Resort Lana'i and remains one of the few major motion pictures to have been filmed on the island, although portions of an episode of the rebooted Hawaii Five-0 were also filmed here. Molokai is another island often overlooked by film crews; the most notable film here with the island as a backdrop is Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, which features a scene on Pohaku Mauliuli Beach on the island's sparsely populated west side.
When visiting any film location in Hawai'i, it's always a good idea to first make sure the site is open to the public, as many popular film sites are on privately-owned land (which makes logistics easier for production). The easiest way to ensure this is to check with a hotel concierge, book with a reputable tour operator, or make an inquiry with a professional travel agent for more information.
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