What is CinemaMapped?
Most WWII films are shot at convenient stand-in locations, not the actual battlefields. Saving Private Ryan was filmed on Curracloe Beach in Ireland. The story takes place on Omaha Beach in Normandy. Band of Brothers was shot largely in England. The story follows Easy Company across France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.
CinemaMapped ignores where the cameras were set up. Every pin on this map marks where the story actually happened — the real town, the real beach, the real building where the historical events portrayed in the film took place. The result is an interactive map that doubles as a guide to the real geography of World War II, told through cinema.
The dataset covers 194 titles — films and series — across six theatres of war: the Western Front, Eastern Front, Pacific, North Africa, Atlantic and Mediterranean. Each pin includes the scene description, historical context, and the year the events were set.
Open the Interactive Map
302 pins. Filter by film, theatre of war, or search by location. Click any pin for the full historical context.
Explore the Map
Western Front Locations
The Western Front — France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany — is the most densely covered theatre on CinemaMapped. D-Day, Operation Market Garden, the Battle of the Bulge and the fall of Berlin have all been portrayed in landmark films and series.
Band of Brothers
Band of Brothers (2001) follows Easy Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne Division from their D-Day jump in Normandy to the Eagle's Nest in Berchtesgaden. The series is set across nine real locations that chart the Allied advance through Western Europe.
- Brécourt Manor, Normandy — Lieutenant Winters leads a 13-man assault on four German artillery pieces on D-Day, June 6, 1944. The attack is studied at West Point as a model infantry assault.
- Carentan, Normandy — Easy Company fights to secure the town connecting Utah and Omaha beach sectors, allowing Allied forces to link up after the landings.
- Eindhoven, Netherlands — Operation Market Garden, September 1944. Easy Company drops into the Netherlands and advances through the first Dutch city to be liberated.
- Nijmegen, Netherlands — The series follows Easy Company's push toward the Rhine as part of the largest airborne operation in history.
- Bastogne, Belgium — The Battle of the Bulge, December 1944. Easy Company holds the frozen forests around Bastogne against a German counteroffensive in temperatures reaching -20°C.
- Berchtesgaden & the Eagle's Nest, Germany — The final episode. Easy Company reaches Hitler's mountain retreat in the Bavarian Alps as the war ends in Europe.
Saving Private Ryan
Saving Private Ryan (1998) opens with the Omaha Beach landings on June 6, 1944 — the most visceral depiction of D-Day ever committed to film. The story is set at two real locations in Normandy.
- Omaha Beach, Normandy — The D-Day landing sector where the 1st and 29th Infantry Divisions suffered over 2,000 casualties in a single morning. The film was shot in Ireland, but the story belongs entirely to this beach.
- Ramelle area, Normandy — The fictional town of Ramelle is based on the Merderet River crossing battles fought by the 82nd Airborne in the days after D-Day.
Dunkirk
Dunkirk (2017) focuses on the evacuation of 338,000 Allied troops from the beaches of northern France in May and June 1940. Christopher Nolan's film is set on the actual beaches where the evacuation took place.
- Dunkirk Beach, France — Operation Dynamo, May–June 1940. Allied forces were trapped against the coast as German forces closed in. The civilian fleet evacuation became one of the defining moments of the early war.
- Dunkirk Mole, France — The East Mole pier from which the majority of soldiers were evacuated, featured prominently in the film's beach and sea storylines.
Other Western Front Titles
A Bridge Too Far
Film · 1977
Operation Market Garden told through the Arnhem bridge battle. Set in Nijmegen, Eindhoven and Arnhem across the Netherlands.
Fury
Film · 2014
A Sherman tank crew pushes into Germany in April 1945. Set in the final weeks of the war as Allied forces crossed the Rhine.
Patton
Film · 1970
George S. Patton's Third Army campaign from North Africa through France and into Germany, 1943–1945.
The Longest Day
Film · 1962
D-Day from all sides. Set on Omaha Beach, Utah Beach, Pointe du Hoc and Pegasus Bridge on June 6, 1944.
Masters of the Air
Series · 2024
The 100th Bomb Group flying B-17s from Thorpe Abbotts, England over occupied Europe. The bloodiest unit in the Eighth Air Force.
Inglourious Basterds
Film · 2009
Set in occupied France, 1941–1944. The fictional Landa interrogation and the climactic Paris cinema scene are the key locations.
Eastern Front Locations
The Eastern Front was the largest and deadliest theatre of the war. Films set here tend to cover the siege of Leningrad, the Battle of Stalingrad, the Holocaust in Poland, and the fall of Berlin. CinemaMapped covers all of these through landmark titles.
Schindler's List
Schindler's List (1993) is set in Kraków and the surrounding region of Nazi-occupied Poland. The film follows Oskar Schindler's efforts to save over 1,200 Jewish workers from deportation and death.
- Kraków Ghetto, Poland — The Podgórze district where the Nazis confined and then liquidated Kraków's Jewish population in 1943. The liquidation scene is one of the most devastating in cinema.
- Płaszów Concentration Camp, Poland — The forced labour camp run by Amon Göth, where Schindler's workers were imprisoned. Göth's villa overlooked the camp from a hillside.
- Brněnec, Czech Republic — Schindler's factory in the Sudetenland, where 1,200 Jews survived the war under his protection.
Downfall
Downfall (2004) depicts the final days of Adolf Hitler in the Führerbunker as Soviet forces closed in on Berlin in April 1945. The film is set in the Reich Chancellery district of central Berlin.
- Führerbunker, Berlin — The underground bunker beneath the Reich Chancellery where Hitler spent his final weeks. The site is now a car park near Potsdamer Platz.
- Berlin city centre — The Battle of Berlin, April 1945. Soviet forces fought street by street through a burning city against Hitler Youth and SS units as the regime collapsed.
The Pianist
The Pianist (2002) follows Władysław Szpilman, a Polish-Jewish pianist who survived the Warsaw Ghetto and the destruction of Warsaw against all odds.
- Warsaw Ghetto, Poland — The largest Jewish ghetto in Nazi-occupied Europe, where over 400,000 Jews were confined before deportation to Treblinka began in 1942.
- Warsaw ruins, Poland — After the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, the Nazis systematically demolished the city block by block. Szpilman hid in the ruins for months.
Other Eastern Front Titles
Enemy at the Gates
Film · 2001
The Battle of Stalingrad, 1942–1943. Set among the ruined factories and apartment blocks where Soviet and German forces fought at point-blank range.
Das Boot
Film · 1981
A German U-boat crew operating in the Atlantic from their base in La Rochelle, France. The definitive submarine film.
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Series · 2024
Set at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where Lale Sokolov tattooed prisoner numbers and fell in love with Gita Furman amid the horrors of the camp.
Valkyrie
Film · 2008
The July 20, 1944 assassination attempt on Hitler. Set at the Wolf's Lair in East Prussia and the Bendlerblock in Berlin.
Pacific Theatre Locations
The Pacific War — fought across thousands of miles of ocean, jungle and volcanic islands from Pearl Harbor to the Japanese home islands — is covered through several landmark productions.
The Pacific
The Pacific (2010) follows three Marines — Leckie, Basilone and Sledge — through the island-hopping campaign from Guadalcanal to Okinawa.
- Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands — The first major American offensive of the Pacific War. Marines held Henderson Field against repeated Japanese counterattacks across six brutal months in 1942–43.
- Peleliu, Palau — One of the costliest battles of the Pacific. The 1st Marine Division suffered 40% casualties taking an island of less than five square miles in September 1944.
- Iwo Jima — The battle for the volcanic island that produced the most iconic photograph of the Second World War. 6,800 Americans died taking it in February–March 1945.
- Okinawa — The final major island battle before a planned invasion of Japan. 12,000 Americans and over 100,000 Japanese soldiers died in the 82-day battle.
Locations by Country
CinemaMapped covers locations across more than 20 countries. These are the most heavily represented:
France
Normandy, Paris, Dunkirk, Alsace
Poland
Warsaw, Kraków, Auschwitz, Łódź
Germany
Berlin, Munich, Berchtesgaden
Netherlands
Eindhoven, Nijmegen, Arnhem
Belgium
Bastogne, Ardennes
Russia
Stalingrad, Leningrad
United States
Pearl Harbor, Pacific bases
Italy
Monte Cassino, Sicily, Rome
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between filming locations and story locations?
A filming location is where the camera was physically placed. A story location is where the historical events actually happened. Most WWII films are shot far from the real sites — Saving Private Ryan was filmed in Ireland, not Normandy. CinemaMapped only maps story locations: the real historical places the film portrays, not the production logistics behind it.
How many WWII films and series does CinemaMapped cover?
CinemaMapped currently covers 194 titles with 302 pinned locations across six theatres of war. The dataset spans films from 1962 (The Longest Day) to 2024 (Masters of the Air, The Tattooist of Auschwitz) and is continuously expanded.
Can I visit these locations?
Most locations on CinemaMapped are real, accessible historical sites. Normandy's beaches, the Bastogne War Memorial, the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial, Berchtesgaden and hundreds of others are open to visitors. Each pin includes the exact coordinates you need to find them.
Which WWII film has the most locations on the map?
Band of Brothers leads with 9 pinned locations, followed by The Pacific with 5. Most feature films have 1–2 primary locations, while multi-episode series covering longer campaigns tend to have more.
Are the locations geographically accurate?
Yes. Every pin is placed at the real historical location the film or series is set at — verified against historical records, the actual events portrayed, and where possible, primary sources. Fictional towns (like Ramelle in Saving Private Ryan) are placed at the real location the fiction is based on.