What Movie Is Filmed In Matera, Italy?

Matera, an inland city in Basilicata, southern Italy, about 400 m above sea level on the edge of the Gravina canyon, has spent more than sixty years doubling as the ancient Middle East on screen. The Sassi, its quarters of cave dwellings and rock-hewn churches cut into pale tufa limestone, need almost no set dressing to read as biblical Judea or Bronze Age villages, which is why directors have returned again and again. The regional tourism board's own film-locations page and the Italy for Movies database, both of which this desk checked, list the titles below. This article sets out every film verified on those official sources, in chronological order, and points to the parts of the city a film-minded visitor can actually see.

What Movie Is Filmed In Matera, Italy?

The films verified on official tourism and film-commission sources are The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964), King David (1985), The Night Sun (1990), The Passion of the Christ (2004), The Nativity Story (2006), The Omen (2006), Wonder Woman (2017) and No Time to Die (2021), plus the TV series Imma Tataranni from 2019. Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979) and Ben-Hur (2016) appear in secondary sources only.

The two biggest names for travellers are Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ and the James Bond film No Time to Die.

Pasolini came first, in 1964, shooting The Gospel According to St. Matthew largely in the Sassi and the surrounding Murgia. The Basilicata tourism board's movie-sets page names the film alongside its later successors, and the Italy for Movies location database, run with the national film commission, carries Matera as a registered location. That single production set the pattern: a biblical story, a small crew by modern standards, and a city that already looked ancient without any construction.

Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ (2004) is the title that made Matera internationally famous as a film set. The tourism board's page is titled "from James Bond to The Passion", and both films appear on it. Catherine Hardwicke's The Nativity Story followed in 2006, with Matera standing in for both Bethlehem and Nazareth, and the same year brought John Moore's remake of The Omen. Patty Jenkins shot sequences of Wonder Woman (2017) in the city, and in 2021 Cary Fukunaga's No Time to Die opened with Daniel Craig's James Bond driving through the Sassi in an Aston Martin, a sequence the Italy for Movies database records against Matera directly.

Two further titles need a caveat. Francesco Rosi's Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979) and the 2016 remake of Ben-Hur are both associated with Matera, but this desk holds them only from secondary sources rather than the official pages listed above, so they are attributed here rather than stated flat. Two other titles you may meet online, Mary Magdalene (2018) and La lupa (1953), could not be confirmed as Matera films at all and should be treated with caution.

Why Do So Many Biblical Epics Choose The Sassi Di Matera?

Because the Sassi already look like the ancient Levant without any set construction, a cave district of pale limestone dwellings and rock-cut churches that UNESCO inscribed in 1993 for, in its own words, continuity over more than two millennia and an outstanding example of a rock-cut settlement adapted to its setting. Directors cast the city as a location rather than building one, and the same streets served as Jerusalem in 1964, again in 2004, and as Bethlehem and Nazareth in 2006.

The practical logic is simple. A production that needs ancient Judea can either build it on a sound stage or find it ready-made, and Matera's Sasso Caveoso and Sasso Barisano quarters, houses and caves stacked along the canyon wall, deliver the look with almost no dressing. UNESCO's inscription, site 670, recognises the Sassi and the Park of the Rupestrian Churches of Matera together, covering 1,016 hectares and, in UNESCO's phrasing, more than a thousand dwellings. That scale means a director can frame an entire ancient town in one shot.

The pattern began with Pasolini and hardened into a tradition after The Passion of the Christ. The Nativity Story reused the city for Bethlehem and Nazareth within two years. Even the James Bond production, no biblical epic, exploited the same visual quality: a car chase through stone lanes that no backlot could fake. The history of Matera explains how a district whose residents were moved out between 1952 and the 1970s became, after a 1986 restoration law and the 1993 inscription, a standing film set and a World Heritage destination.

The Old Town walk in that list covers the same lanes the film crews used, with a private guide. It pairs naturally with a look at the wider landscape: the Murgia plateau opposite the Sassi, protected as a regional park, is where several productions framed their distance shots of the cave city.

Which James Bond Scenes Were Shot In Matera?

No Time to Die (2021), directed by Cary Fukunaga, is the James Bond film shot in Matera, and the Italy for Movies location database registers the city directly against it. The early sequence with Daniel Craig's Bond arriving and driving an Aston Martin through the Sassi used the city's stepped lanes and canyon-edge streets. The production put Matera on the film's poster-facing imagery, and the city now markets the connection openly on its official tourism channels.

The Bond connection runs deep enough that the regional tourism board pairs Bond with The Passion of the Christ on its movie-sets page. Interest in the filming has spilled into local tourism, and readers curious about the star's own accommodation can read where Daniel Craig stayed in Matera. The chase route is not hard to trace in outline: the Sassi are compact, and the canyon-edge streets visible in the film are the same ones a visitor walks today.

One caution from this desk: scene-level detail, exactly which street or church hosted which shot, was not verified on the official sources, so this article does not pin individual scenes to individual lanes. Guided walks themed on the Bond locations exist among the city's tours, and a local guide will point out framed spots on the ground, which is more reliable than an unsourced list online.

Where In Matera Can You See The Film Locations Yourself?

The answer is: nearly everywhere you already wanted to go, because the locations and the main sights overlap almost completely. The Sasso Caveoso and Sasso Barisano quarters, the canyon-edge terraces, Piazza San Pietro Caveoso, the viewpoints across the Gravina toward the Murgia plateau, and the rupestrian churches open to visitors are all within the area the film productions used.

No ticket exists for "the film locations": the locations are the city itself, and the standard sightseeing admission prices, such as Oltre l'Arte's ticket listing one rupestrian church at 4.50 EUR or three at 10.00 EUR, cover the interiors.

A film-minded walk needs no special route. Start on the Piano, the modern plateau above the Sassi, and look down over the stone sea of roofs and caves that every director framed. Descend into Sasso Caveoso toward Piazza San Pietro Caveoso, the square that anchors the lower district, then work along the canyon edge where the Bond chase imagery lives. Cross to or view the Belvedere Murgia Timone on the opposite plateau for the full postcard panorama, the one that appears in almost every film's establishing shots.

The interiors worth entering are the rock-cut churches, Santa Lucia alle Malve, Madonna de Idris and San Pietro Barisano, all run by the same operator with a combined ticket. For the deeper background on the cave churches as a group, the site's rupestrian churches of Matera guide collects them.

The TV series Imma Tataranni, a prosecutor drama running from 2019, is the one production that films Matera as Matera rather than as antiquity. Five seasons and 26 episodes are recorded against the location in the film database, which means the city now appears on screens as a living southern Italian town, not only as a stand-in for the ancient world.

Is There A Film Festival Or Film Tour In Matera?

Yes to both. The Matera Film Festival runs its seventh edition from 7 to 15 November 2026, twinned with the city of Tétouan, on dates published on the festival's own site, and the city hosts a year-round supply of guided walks themed on its film locations, including Bond-focused options among the tours listed on this site. The festival twinning and edition number are stated by the organisers themselves; the programme detail is the place to check closer to the date.

A city with this filming history naturally built an institution around it. The festival's seventh edition in November 2026 is verified on the organiser's own page, and Matera's broader cultural calendar, covered in the site's Matera events guide, runs from the Festa della Bruna on 2 July, a feast the organisers date to 1389, through the winter living nativity, the Presepe Vivente, whose own site lists tickets at 12.00 EUR full and 9.00 EUR for ages 10 to 18 with under 10s free on its December 2026 public days.

For travellers who want film plus food, the region rewards the combination. The e-bike day trip toward Alberobello with focaccia and wine stops, this page's related tour, shows the other landscape Basilicata and neighbouring Puglia offer once you leave the canyon, and a guide-led ride makes a good counterweight to days spent walking the Sassi. Readers weighing the city overall can start with is Matera Italy worth visiting and how many nights should I stay in Matera.

Common Questions About Movies Filmed In Matera

What movie is filmed in Matera, Italy?

The verified list is The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964), King David (1985), The Night Sun (1990), The Passion of the Christ (2004), The Nativity Story (2006), The Omen (2006), Wonder Woman (2017), No Time to Die (2021) and the series Imma Tataranni (from 2019). Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979) and Ben-Hur (2016) are attributed from secondary sources only.

Was The Passion of the Christ filmed in Matera?

Yes. Mel Gibson's 2004 film is one of the two productions the official tourism board leads with, and it appears on both the regional movie-sets page and the national film location database.

Which James Bond movie was filmed in Matera?

No Time to Die (2021). The Italy for Movies database registers Matera directly against the production, which used the Sassi and their canyon-edge lanes for its opening sequences.

Can you visit the Matera film locations without a tour?

Yes. The locations are the Sassi themselves, which are public streets and squares, so a self-guided walk costs nothing beyond any church or museum entries you choose to add. Guided walks add scene-by-scene commentary that unsourced online lists cannot be trusted for.

Was Wonder Woman filmed in Matera?

Yes, sequences of the 2017 film were shot in the city, and the title is listed on both the regional tourism board's movie-sets page and the Italy for Movies database.

Whether you come for Bond, for Pasolini or simply for the stone city both of them framed, the practical planning pages on Matera Travel Guide cover where to stay and how long to give the Sassi, and the walks and rides above are the easiest way into the lanes the cameras made famous.