Anyone who has seen the first images from The Dog Stars, Ridley Scott’s latest film and felt they recognised something was right. The director chose Italy as the main setting for his post-apocalyptic film, creating scenery that feels both familiar and strange.
With a budget of $110 million, a crew of more than 400 Italian professionals and 100 international staff, The Dog Stars is one of the largest productions filmed in Italy in recent years.
Discover the locations where The Dog Stars was filmed and how Scott turned Italy into the US state of Colorado.
Where was The Dog Stars filmed? Italian locations
Filming for The Dog Star, Ridley Scott’s film starring Jacob Elordi and Margaret Qualley, began on 29 April 2025 on the shores of Lake Bordano in Friuli-Venezia Giulia.
This small artificial lake in the comune of Bordano, also home to the Butterfly House, marked the start of a film shoot that crossed four Italian regions.
After the first week in Friuli, production moved to Cansiglio, a plateau in the Belluno Prealps, on the border between Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia.
Scott filmed key scenes around the comune of Polcenigo, the Cansiglio Forest, the Vallorch area, the Cimbrian villages, and the areas called Le Rotte and La Genzianella. The crew used Polcenigo as its base, with the Dolomites forming a natural backdrop.
Cansiglio’s filming locations also include the Cimbrian villages of Cansiglio, small historic settlements inhabited for centuries by descendants of medieval Germanic peoples.
Abruzzo: the Sirente mountains become Colorado
After Veneto, production moved to Abruzzo, inside Sirente-Velino Regional Natural Park. Filming centred on the comuni of Secinaro and Ovindoli, and also included L’Aquila’s Airport of the Parks in Preturo. In the film, the airport hangar serves as the protagonist’s refuge.
Sirente-Velino is one of the largest regional parks in the central Apennines, with elevations exceeding 2,000 metres. Its open expanses, forests and high-altitude pastures persuaded Scott that he could recreate the American Great Plains without leaving Italy.
Rome: Cinecittà and the Rationalist EUR district
After Abruzzo came the Rome leg of the shoot. The Dog Stars will now join the list of films shot at Cinecittà, Rome’s historic studios, which have also hosted productions such as Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York and dozens of large-scale Hollywood films. Indoor sets and several urban sequences were created at Cinecittà.
For exterior scenes, Scott selected EUR, the district designed during Fascist rule for the planned 1942 Universal Exposition. Filming took place on Via Cristoforo Colombo, Viale della Civiltà del Lavoro — home to the famous “Square Colosseum” — Viale dell’Arte and Via della Pittura.
Cansiglio: why Ridley Scott chose this location
Cansiglio is a karst plateau straddling Veneto and Friuli, around 1,000 metres above sea level and covered by one of Europe’s largest beech forests. For Ridley Scott, Cansiglio brought together dense woodland, open spaces, northern light and a topography reminiscent of parts of Colorado’s mountainous terrain.
The Cimbrian communities of Cansiglio, particularly around Grava and the villages of Pian Osteria, add old rural buildings that feel almost out of time. In a post-apocalyptic setting, they take on an even stronger symbolic role.
The plot of The Dog Stars: stars after the end
The Dog Stars is set in the near future, after a devastating pandemic has wiped out almost the entire global population.
The protagonist is Hig, played by Jacob Elordi, a pilot living in isolation in an abandoned hangar close to an airstrip. He shares the place with his loyal dog, Jasper, and war veteran Bangley, played by Josh Brolin.
Together, they have created a defence system to survive external threats.
Hig keeps a Cessna airworthy and spends his time flying over desolate terrain, holding on to a small thread of hope and memories of the world as it was. During one of these flights, he receives a mysterious radio transmission from a direction he has never explored.
He then sets off to find the source of that voice, along with something resembling a possible future.
On the journey, he meets Pony, played by Margaret Qualley, and the story takes an unexpected turn.
Cast, director and facts about The Dog Stars
Initial social-media reactions following press screenings highlighted the film’s striking visual impact and carefully crafted staging, although opinions were divided on the strength of the screenplay. Here are the technical details.
- Based on a novel: the film is based on the 2012 novel of the same name by Peter Heller, a bestseller that has built a solid fan base over the years.
- Director: Ridley Scott.
- Cast: alongside Jacob Elordi and Margaret Qualley, the cast includes Josh Brolin, Guy Pearce, Allison Janney and Benedict Wong.
- Genre: action, thriller and science fiction.
- Filming period: nine weeks of filming, between April and June 2025, across four Italian regions.
- Distribution: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.
- Production: 20th Century Studios and Scott Free Productions.
- Year: 2026.
- Running time: 118 minutes.
- Where to watch it: in Italian cinemas. The film is not currently available on streaming platforms.
- 400 Italian professionals: the production involved an exceptionally high number of local technicians and professionals, with more than 400 taking part. This made The Dog Stars a significant investment in Italian cinema in terms of skills and employment.
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