THE NUN | 2018


- Locations |
- Romania
- DIRECTOR |
- Corin Hardy
Discover the film locations for The Nun, the spin-off from The Conjuring movies, around Romania – including Corvin Castle in Transylvania; the Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest; Mogoşoaia Palace and Fort II in Mogoşoaia; and Criș Bethlen Castle, Sighișoara.
The film is a kind of origin story for demonic nun Valak, with plenty of dark passage prowling and jump shocks but not too much in the way of story.
The film was based, and the sets built, at Castel Film Studios in Izvorani, about 30 miles north of the Romanian capital Bucharest, and the practical locations were found around Romania.
The studios, which opened in 1992, previously hosted filming for Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain (2003), with Nicole Kidman and Renée Zellweger, and 2011's Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, with Nicolas Cage, along with many horror and fantasy productions.
The "Vatican", from where Father Anthony Burke (Demián Bichir) is sent to investigate the apparent suicide of a nun at the “Abbey of St Carta” (which actually is supposed to be in Romania), is the vast Palace of the Parliament Strada Izvor 2-4, Bucharest.
The building of this vanity project for former President Nicolae Ceaușescu involved relocating 40,000 people, demolishing 2.7 square miles of the old city and was 13 years under construction. In fact, it was finally completed in 1997, eight years after the dictator had been deposed and executed.
For some reason, it holds the odd title of Heaviest Building in the World (just under four and a half million tons if you were wondering, but don't ask me how they weighed it). You can visit on guided tours.
The palace has also been seen in Todd Phillips’ 2016 War Dogs, with Jonah Hill and Miles Teller, as well as Paul Schrader’s 2014 Dying of the Light, with Nicolas Cage.

Fr Burke is mysteriously advised to seek out a young novitiate named Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga), who’s teaching at “St Vincent’s”, a girls’ school in "London". And if the institution doesn’t look terribly English, yes, it’s in Romania.
It's Mogoşoaia Palace, Strada Valea Parcului 1, in Mogoşoaia, about six miles northwest of Bucharest. The palace dates from 1702, and is named for the widow of the Romanian boyar (Eastern European aristocrat) Mogoș, who once owned the land. Now a tourist destination, it currently houses a museum and art gallery (Muzeul de Artă Brâncovenească).
We’ll be returning to Mogoşoaia, though not the palace, shortly.
Fr Burke and Sister Irene, along with local handyman Frenchie (Jonas Bloquet) who discovered the body of the dead nun, visit the sinister looking abbey and, as is usually the case with remote European castles on screen, they don't get the warmest welcome imaginable.

Nevertheless, determined to stay and investigate, Fr Burke and Sister Irene are put up in the abbey's lodgings. The bedrooms, and the “icehouse” in which Frenchie thoughtfully stored the body of the nun, are the 14th century Criș Bethlen Castle, str. Castelul Bethlen nr. 187, Criș, a village lying a few miles southwest of Sighișoara.
Sighișoara itself is a city on the Târnava Mare River in Mureș County, central Romania. It's a popular tourist destination for its well-preserved old town, listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. You might be interested to know that here you can find Vlad Dracul House, Piața Cetății 8, birthplace in 1431 of Vlad the Impaler, the historical character who inspired Bram Stoker's Dracula. It now houses a restaurant (write your own joke here).
The Gothic exterior and the courtyard of "Abbey of St Carta" itself are Corvin Castle (also known as Hunyadi Castle), Hunedoara, about 100 miles east of Timișoara.
The 15th century castle, much revamped in the 17th century, went on to suffer the ravages of a fire and years of neglect and its subsequent restoration owes perhaps more to Gothic Romanticism than architectural accuracy. What might horrify historians is just right for the screen.

The entrance gate, where Frenchie discovers the hanging body of the nun, was a piece of set-dressing added to the rear of the castle, which is actually entered via a bridge. The owners requested that it be left standing at the end of the shoot to boost tourism. I've no idea if it's still there.
At this point I'd usually say something like “You might recognise Corvin Castle from...", but the chances are you didn't notice it as the decrepit palace of Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård) in Robert Eggers' 2024 re-imagining of Nosferatu. It's only used for a few wide shots, and most of that film was made in the Czech Republic.
Now we return to Mogoşoaia. Just to the east of the city on Șoseaua Odăii stands the old Mogosoaia Fort II (Fortul II Mogoșoaia), one of 18 forts built to defend Bucharest.
17 forts remain, many on the territory of military units, most being abandoned and flooded. Fort II is hidden under vegetation and seemingly pretty inaccessible to the public.
Its bowels served as the lower depths of the Abbey where Sister Irene levitates as the demon attempts to possess her.