Missouri might not be the movie capital of America, but the Show Me State often shows off when filmmakers shoot their work here. A wide array of films have been made in Missouri over a remarkable span of time.
To perhaps spy a familiar scene, and see it in a new way, it's worth giving these films a watch. Here are just 15 of the many films to be shot within our state, and how you can find them at home.
Streaming information is, of course, subject to change.
'Adam at 6 a.m.' (1970)
Director: Robert Scheerer
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Cast: Michael Douglas, Lee Purcell, Joe Don Baker
Missouri locations: Excelsior Springs, Cameron, Orrick
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes. Douglas plays a college professor who treks from California to Missouri for a relative’s funeral.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime or Apple TV
'Paper Moon' (1973)
Director: Peter Bogdanovich
Cast: Ryan O'Neal, Tatum O'Neal, Madeline Kahn
Missouri location: St. Joseph
Does the story involve Missouri? St. Joseph is the eventual destination for a con man who reluctantly volunteers to deliver a recently-orphaned girl to a relative's home.
Rating: PG
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Paramount Plus
'Escape From New York' (1981)
Director: John Carpenter
Cast: Kurt Russell, Lee Van Cleef, Ernest Borgnine, Donald Pleasence, Isaac Hayes
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? No. While, as the title suggests, Russell's Snake Plissken takes a presidential rescue mission to Manhattan in the then-near future (1997), many of the film's urban scenes were filmed on both the Missouri and Illinois sides of St. Louis.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Apple TV, Amazon Prime
'Koyaanisqatsi' (1982)
Director: Godfrey Reggio
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? This experimental film examines the relationship between people and their surroundings, whether urban or wild. The film prominently features footage of the demolition of St. Louis' infamous Pruitt-Igoe housing project.
Rating: Unrated
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV
'National Lampoon's Vacation' (1983)
Director: Harold Ramis
Cast: Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Anthony Michael Hall
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? Momentarily. Clark Griswold and his family's Great American Vacation takes a detour through St. Louis, in which the family "truckster" is vandalized in a scene which plays to stereotypes about the city.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Netflix
'Planes, Trains and Automobiles' (1987)
Director: John Hughes
Cast: Steve Martin, John Candy
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? Briefly, but oh so memorably. One of the classic modern road-trip movies — and the definitive Thanksgiving film —stages one of its most iconic scenes in the Show Me State. After their train breaks down in Missouri, Martin and Candy are bussed to St. Louis where Martin's airport freakout takes place at Lambert International Airport.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV
'White Palace' (1990)
Director: Luis Mandoki
Cast: Susan Sarandon, James Spader
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes. Spader and Sarandon's star-crossed lovers live in St. Louis, with Sarandon's work as a waitress depicted at a real diner in the city.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime
‘Ride with the Devil’ (1999)
Director: Ang Lee
Cast: Tobey Maguire, Skeet Ulrich, Jewel
Missouri locations: Pattonsburg, Kansas City, Lexington
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes, the Civil War drama revolves around the skirmishes between Missouri Irregulars and Kansas Jayhawkers.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV
‘Fever Pitch’ (2005)
Directors: Peter and Bobby Farrelly
Cast: Drew Barrymore, Jimmy Fallon
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes. In this rom-com, Boston Red Sox obsessive Ben (Fallon) and girlfriend Lindsey (Barrymore) visit Busch Stadium for the fourth game of the 2004 Red Sox-Cardinals World Series. A scene of Fallon and Barrymore’s characters celebrating on the field happened in real-time.
Rating: PG-13
Where to stream: Disney+, Amazon Prime, Apple TV
'Killshot' (2008)
Director: John Madden
Cast: Diane Lane, Thomas Jane, Mickey Rourke, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Rosario Dawson
Missouri location: Cape Girardeau
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes. In this mafia thriller, a pair of witnesses seeking protection are relocated to Missouri.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime
'Up in the Air' (2009)
Director: Jason Reitman
Cast: George Clooney, Anna Kendrick, Vera Farmiga, Jason Bateman
Missouri location: St. Louis
Does the story involve Missouri? Yes, the film features scenes set at Lambert airport, but St. Louis also stands in for a number of Middle American cities throughout the narrative.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Netflix, Paramount Plus
'Winter's Bone' (2010)
Director: Debra Granik
Cast: Jennifer Lawrence, John Hawkes, Garret Dillahunt
Missouri locations: Locales within Taney and Christian counties
Does the story involve Missouri? The film which made a then-20-year-old Jennifer Lawrence is indeed set within an insular Ozarks, where a teen girl fights for her family's future and tries to track down her father.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Peaco*ck
'You're Next' (2011)
Director: Adam Wingard
Cast: Sharni Vinson, Nicholas Tucci, Wendi Glenn, A.J. Bowen
Missouri location: Columbia
Does the story involve Missouri? Written by Columbia native Simon Barrett, this home invasion horror flick is set within Show Me State borders.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Hulu
'Gone Girl' (2014)
Director: David Fincher
Cast: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry
Missouri location: Cape Girardeau
Does the story involve Missouri? Based on Kansas City native Gillian Flynn's smash novel, this marital drama-and-missing woman thriller travels to the fictional Missouri town of North Carthage.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Amazon Prime, Disney+, HBO Max, Hulu
'American Honey' (2016)
Director: Andrea Arnold
Cast: Sasha Lane, Shia LaBeouf, Riley Keough
Missouri location: Kansas City
Does the story involve Missouri? The road-trip movie involves passage through Kansas City.
Rating: R
Where to stream: Showtime Anytime, Amazon Prime, Apple TV
To learn about more films made in Missouri, visit the Missouri Film Office at https://mofilm.org/about/filmed-in-missouri/, among other sources.
Aarik Danielsen is the features and culture editor for the Tribune. Contact him at adanielsen@columbiatribune.com or by calling 573-815-1731. Find him on Twitter @aarikdanielsen.
