Great St Bernard Pass, Italy: The Italian Job

As one of the greatest driving films of all time, the original 1969 version of The Italian Job, starring Michael Caine, opens with the gentle sound of Matt Monro’s On Days Like These as a V12 Lamborghini Muria blasts its way up the narrow mountain pass. With both wide, swooping shots and first-person perspective, director Peter Collinson captured the majesty of one of the Alps’ most spectacular passes, which connects Italy’s Aosta Valley to Martigny, in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. 

Car: 1968 Lamborghini Muria 

San Francisco, USA: Bullitt

With its hills, trams and landmark Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco was chosen by English director Peter Yates as the location for Steve McQueen’s epic car chase in the 1968 film Bullitt. At nine minutes long, the chase is widely regarded as not just the first but also the finest car chase in Hollywood history, as McQueen pursues the black 1968 Dodge Charger in his green 1968 Ford Mustang, leaping down the city’s hills with views over the bay in the background.    

Car: 1968 Ford Mustang 390 GT 2+2 Fastback

Argentina to Peru: The Motorcycle Diaries

This 2004 biopic follows a young Ernesto Guevara (who came to be known the world over as ‘Che’) as he and a friend travel 8,000 miles across South America on a two-wheeled journey of discovery. Director Walter Salles filmed scenes featuring rivers, great plains and mountains in both Chile and Peru, as well as Argentina, Venezuela and Colombia.

Motorbike: 1939 Norton 500

Tokyo, Japan: You Only Live Twice

In contrast to most Bond car chases, this epic high-speed drive takes place with 007 in the passenger seat, while his female accomplice Aki takes the wheel. Starting with an open-top blast through the narrow streets of Tokyo, the pair are pursued across the city in their Toyota 2000GT until they reach the surrounding countryside, where the villains are dispatched in spectacular style. (Trivia: When the Bond producers took delivery of the car, Sean Connery was too tall to fit inside, so the Japanese carmaker simply chopped off the roof to make the only topless Toyota 2000GT in the world.)

Car: 1967 Toyota 2000GT

Arkansas to Grand Canyon, USA: Thelma and Louise

In this tragic tale, directed by Ridley Scott and released in 1991, two friends – Thelma and Louise – embark on an epic road trip across America, from their homes in Arkansas to Arizona’s Grand Canyon. Although it’s a fictional route, Scott shot most of the scenes in California and Utah. From the luscious green landscapes of Lockwood Valley, north of Los Angeles, to the dry deserts and canyons of Utah and Arizona, this all-American road trip sees the duo travel behind the wheel of a 1966 Ford Thunderbird convertible.  

Car: 1966 Ford Thunderbird convertible