Hollywood has a long-standing tradition of laying waste to famous landmarks and monuments. This iconoclasm can be what draws us in to see these films. In the Western world, these landmarks transcend the countries they are located in and become something that we all share as citizens of the Earth. They’re places we specifically go to visit, landmarks you learn about in school, and the tragic fire at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris this year is a testament to that fact.

It wasn’t just Parisians, the French, or even Catholics that felt loss that day. But everyone that turned on their televisions or picked up a newspaper to see the famous cathedral ablaze, felt as though the global community had lost something that day. Luckily, restoration is underway and we could see it restored entirely to its former glory.

There’s something so visceral and alluring about the spectacle of it. And it’s that spectacle that Hollywood loves to create for the silver screen over and over again. These monumental destructions then most likely feature in all of the marketing materials too, as there is such an appeal to it. On this theme, Vibrant Doors made these travel posters from landmarks destroyed by movie monsters in a vintage, retro style and I’ve featured them here for you to check out!

The Hollywood Sign - Terminator: Salvation (2009)

This 2009 iteration of the Terminator franchise is perhaps more well-known for Christian Bale’s expletive on-set rant than as an actual body of work. Nonetheless, in this film, Skynet destroyed Hollywood’s most iconic symbol. It wasn’t the first film to destroy the Hollywood sign and it certainly won’t be the last. Considering the Hollywood sign cost about $21,000 and blockbuster films have budgets of hundreds of millions, they could reasonably do hundreds of takes where they actually destroy the sign.

The Statue of Liberty - Cloverfield (2008)

The 2008 ‘recovered footage’ thriller Cloverfield, gave us the stunning visual of a decapitated Libertas from The Statue of Liberty. This was used for the movie poster too and it was an effective visual that certainly piqued interest in the movie’s unique style and the quality of the visual effects that would be featured. The franchise has gone on to see two sequels within the ‘Cloververse’. 

The Golden Gate Bridge - Pacific Rim (2013)

It doesn’t take long for the action to begin in Pacific Rim, the opening sequence of the film depicting the complete destruction of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Like Cloverfield, Pacific Rim features ‘kaiju’, which is Japanese for ‘strange beast’. These tend to be giant, amphibious, reptilian creatures with the most famous being, of course, Godzilla. 

Potter School House - The Birds (1963)

This is a bit of an exception as the Potter School House is only a landmark now because of this film, but Alfred Hitchcock’s seminal horror film The Birds features the school house of Bodega Bay, CA meeting a grisly fate. The film never explains why the birds of Bodega Bay turn vicious but this cerebral horror film defined a genre. 

The Millenium Bridge - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (2009)

The Harry Potter film franchise may be the crown jewel of the UK film industry. The massively successful franchise has seen global success and is a completely generational story. Many of the fans of Harry Potter grew up at the same time as the film’s characters and it has one of the largest and most dedicated fan bases in history.

The Taj Mahal - Mars Attacks (1996)

Tim Burton’s satirical monster movie Mars Attacks saw the destruction of a fair few notable landmarks including Mount Rushmore, Big Ben in London and the Moai statues on Easter Island. Less of a cinematic spectacle and more for comic effect, this film had a mixed critical reception and definitely seems to fall into the ‘love it or hate it’ category of film.