Colonnaded stone streets open onto four walled squares, with laundry strung across the balconies above.
What Habana Vieja looks like
Four stone plazas anchor the old walled city, each ringed by two and three storey colonial buildings with a continuous ground floor arcade. Narrow streets run between them on a dense colonial grid, barely wide enough for one car, with iron balconies and window grilles close enough across the street to nearly touch.
Facades are stucco over stone, painted in faded ochre, pink and pale blue, with wrought iron balconies and shuttered wooden doors at street level. Laundry hangs strung between upper floor railings on the residential blocks, and stone columns carry the arcades along the commercial fronts.
's coral stone Baroque facade and two unequal bell towers close one side of Plaza de la Catedral, built between 1748 and 1777. Two blocks away, is ringed by the , a stone fortress begun in 1558, and a colonnaded building with blue shuttered windows.
and carry the same stone paving and arcaded fronts, with cafe tables set under the colonnades. Vintage American cars from the 1950s line the curbs throughout the district, and pedal powered bicitaxis with red canvas canopies work the cobblestones.
Shot in Habana Vieja
Carol Reed's Our Man in Havana used Plaza de la Catedral in 1959, filming Havana as itself under Alec Guinness's cover as a reluctant spy. The Fate of the Furious returned in 2016, with Charlize Theron shooting a scene on the hill at .
Our Man in Havana, 1959
Carol Reed shot Our Man in Havana on location at Plaza de la Catedral in March 1959, with Alec Guinness playing a vacuum cleaner salesman turned reluctant spy. The film plays Havana as itself, set in the same year it was shot, and Fidel Castro visited the crew on the square that May. Street View
The Fate of the Furious, 2017
Loma del Ángel
The Fate of the Furious shot for two weeks across Havana in April and May 2016, the first major Hollywood production in Cuba in over fifty years. Charlize Theron filmed a scene on the hill at Loma del Ángel, with Vin Diesel and Michelle Rodríguez present through the Havana shoot. Street View
Cádiz stood in for Havana itself in Die Another Day, its La Caleta beach and colonial old town serving as Cuba when the production could not shoot there. The narrow cobbled streets and colourful stucco facades carry the same colonial grid at a similar scale to Habana Vieja. Cádiz's buildings run a shade more pastel and the harbor opens onto the Atlantic rather than a bay, so a wide establishing shot needs careful framing to keep the coastline out. Try searching colonial old town streets now.
Old San Juan doubled for 1950s Havana itself in Dirty Dancing Havana Nights, its pastel colonial rowhouses and cobblestone streets standing in for the city. Assassin's Creed later used the same streets as fifteenth century Spain, which says something about how adaptable the fabric reads on camera. San Juan's colonial grid climbs a hillside rather than running flat, so a wide shot needs a level block to hold the match. Try searching pastel colonial rowhouses now.
Ciudad Amurallada in Cartagena, Colombia
Gemini Man carried a motorcycle chase along Cartagena's own ramparts and Love in the Time of Cholera used its colonial streets as Cartagena itself, both proving the Walled City holds up under a moving camera, though neither production used it to stand in for Havana. Balconied townhouses and a dense colonial grid give it the same walled port town scale as Habana Vieja. Cartagena's buildings run brighter and more saturated in colour than Havana's faded pastels, so a muted grade helps hold the match in wider shots. Try searching colonial walled city street now.
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