When Lights, Camera, Action Go Global: Indian Films like ‘Varanasi’ Shot in the Most Stunning Locations on Earth

SS Rajamouli looked at the entire world and found it insufficient. His upcoming film “Varanasi”, starring Mahesh Babu and Priyanka Chopra, becomes the fifth production in cinema history to shoot on the Antarctic continent. It is an extreme decision, but also a logical one for a filmmaker who has never once treated location as a backdrop. It got us thinking: Indian Cinema has been doing this for a while. From a Maldavian shore that glows in the dark to a glacial lagoon in Iceland that was mistaken for a VFX trick, these are the films that made the world their set while also making it impossible for the audience to look away.

'Dilwale, Gerua' Song (2015) – South Coast of Iceland

The ‘Gerua’ music video from “Dilwale” starring SRK and Kajol was entirely shot on the South Coast of Iceland, with a crashed military plane on the black sand beach and floating glaciers being the prop of the song. This was a first for Bollywood in the country, as the locations included the Skógafoss waterfall, Sólheimasandur plane wreck, and Diamond Beach, a very unusual pick.

'3 Idiots' (2009) – Pangong Tso, Ladakh

The final reunion scene with the yellow bike, the blue lake, and the icy mountains made Pangong Tso one of India’s most visited film locations for the audience. The climax of “3 Idiots”, featuring Aamir Khan, Kareena Kapoor, and their friends, was shot at Ladakh’s Pangong Lake, which stretches across India and Tibet at an altitude of 14,000 feet with an unreal backdrop. 

'Tamasha' (2015) – Corsica, France

Imtiaz Ali has always understood that the right location doesn't illustrate the story; it becomes it. For “Tamasha”, a film about a man who forgets who he truly is, he chose Corsica, an island that sits between France and Italy and belongs fully to neither. The ‘Matargashti’ song was filmed in Bastia, the island’s historic port city, and the film also used the Staircase of the King of Aragon, which has 187 steps cut into a limestone cliff, a location so visually specific as to add a meaningful element to a film.

Related Stories

When Lights, Camera, Action Go Global: Indian Films like ‘Varanasi’ Shot in the Most Stunning Locations on Earth

SS Rajamouli Launches India’s Largest Motion Capture Facility at Annapurna Studios, Uses It for His Next Epic ‘Varanasi’

'Ek Villain' (2014) – Vaadhoo Island, Maldives

Mohit Suri didn't just find a pretty beach. He found a beach that glows. The ‘Galliyan’ sequence for the movie “Ek Villain”, starring Sidharth Malhotra and Shraddha Kapoor, was shot on Vaadhoo Island in the Maldives. Here, the shoreline bioluminescence at night is a natural phenomenon. This turns the surf into something that looks, without exaggeration, like an ocean lit from within. It looked like a visual effects trick, but it wasn't. 

‘Aadujeevitham: The Goat Life’ (2024) – Wadi Rum, Jordan & the Algerian Sahara

The story is set in Saudi Arabia, but it is shot in Wadi Rum, Jordan, the same red-sand desert where Denis Villeneuve was simultaneously filming ‘Dune: Part Two’, and the crews ran into each other, which is the kind of detail that only makes sense in the context of a production that took sixteen years to complete. When COVID locked the crew in the desert for seventy days in 2020, the animals were imported from Saudi Arabia because the Jordanian desert did not have the right livestock. Prithviraj Sukumaran has said that the desert stopped being just a location and became a character. 

'Robot' (2010) – Machu Picchu

Director Shankar and cinematographer Rathnavelu reportedly spent about three weeks touring the globe before landing in South America for two key sequences. The “Kilimanjaro” song was shot in Peru, and “Kadhal Anukkal” was filmed in Brazil. With a landscape of white dunes and seasonal lagoons in Maranhão state that looks, depending on the season, like a desert that has flooded. “Robot,” starring Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Rajinikanth, became the first Indian film to shoot in South America. 

'RRR' (2022) – Presidential Palace, Kyiv, Ukraine

The ‘Natu Natu’ sequence in the movie “RRR”, which won an Oscar, almost didn't happen in Ukraine at all. The song was originally planned to be shot in India, but the monsoon season forced the team to scout for new locations, leading them to shoot at the Presidential Palace in Kyiv, Ukraine. The film was otherwise shot at many different locations across Hyderabad, Delhi, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, and Ukraine over a span of 300 days in total.

'Varanasi' (2027) – Antarctica

One of the most insane entries isn’t even out yet. SS Rajamouli’s “Varanasi”, starring Mahesh Babu and Priyanka Chopra, releasing in 2027, is the first Indian film and only the fifth film in the world to be shot in Antarctica. A globetrotting Indiana Jones-style adventure with a budget of reportedly touching ₹1,200 crore, and yes, Rajamouli took his crew to the literal end of the earth to make it happen.

These films collectively proved that the Indian cinema never really needed a studio to do its best work. The best frames were found in the corners of the world, including black sand beaches, glacial mountains, and bioluminescent surfs. This is the logical endpoint of an industry that has always believed that the world is not too big a canvas.