Under The Tuscan Sun | 2003

There's just the tiniest glimpse of San Francisco (even less than you might have thought) but plenty of the real Italy in Audrey Wells' loose adaptation of Frances Mayes' bestseller. Find out what was filmed where.

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Let's get San Francisco out of the way first – just two brief exterior shots: the glum hotel where Frances (Diane Lane) stays after her divorce and the Mecca Restaurant, where she dines with friend Patti (Sandra Oh), which stood at 2029 Market Street but closed in 2009. It’s now The Apothecarium, a dispensary for medical marijuana. And that's it.

The San Francisco interiors were recreated at Cinecittà Studios in Rome – although the 'restaurant' was filmed inside a Rome branch of Tod's stores.

In the autobiographical book, Frances remains happily married throughout. To give the film a dramatic structure, Wells adds the divorce, allowing Frances’ renovation of the villa to mirror the rebuilding of her life.

And the break-up also provides a neat catalyst for her trip to Italy, utilising the spare seat on a gay coach tour.

The title of the film was always going to be a hostage to fortune with the weather conditions and, yes, the production was dogged with grey skies and rain. Arriving in Florence in front of the famous Florence Cathedral (Santa Maria del Fiore) in the Piazza del Duomo, the bad weather was turned to good use as a visual gag with the tourists getting their first glimpse of "sunny Italy" from beneath umbrellas.

Throughout the film, Wells, cinematographer Geoffrey Simpson and the film crew do a sterling job of disguising weather conditions.

Next stop on the tour is Cortona, an Etruscan hilltop town in Arezzo, 50 miles south of Florence (the nearest airport is Perugia, 30 miles away). Most of the film is now centred around the town and its main square, Piazza Signorelli. If you're visiting, probably the first thing you’ll notice is that there is no grand fountain here. That was a fibreglass construction added to accommodate the homage to Fellini’s La Dolce Vita with the extravagantly Bohemian Katherine (Lindsay Duncan) wallowing in the water like Anita Ekberg in Rome's Trevi Fountain. This is one of several verbal and visual references to Federico Fellini throughout the film.

There really is a Villa Bramasole but since it has – obviously – been renovated, a more neglected double was needed for the film.

This is Villa Laura, Case Sparse Le Contesse, 207, just off SP35 about a mile southeast of Cortona, which was used for both exteriors and interiors. The great news for fans of the film is that it has not only been beautifully restored but is now operated as a guest house. Yes, you can stay there and enjoy the whole experience first hand – although don't go looking for the roadside shrine where the old man leaves flowers. That too was added just for the film.

The real Villa Bramasole (please be respectful of the residents) which inspired the book, is at Località Torreone, 151,about a half-hour walk east of the centre of Cortona.

The cinema to which Frances takes Pawel, one of the three Polish workers renovating the house, is Teatro Signorelli, Piazza Luca Signorelli. They watch George Of The Jungle – the script of which was written by Audrey Wells, which must have helped enormously with copyright clearances.

Built in 1854, the historic theatre, now used for both live theatre and cinema, previously became the 'opera house' in Roberto Benigni's 1997 Oscar-winning La Vita E Bella (Life Is Beautiful).

Katherine's apartment, where she’s being painted by a naked art student (the little pants are a digital addition to prevent his bare bum from getting the film a more adult rating) is Palazzo Diligenti on Via Guelfa just south of the centre of Cortona. It’s claimed that France's Emperor Napoleon III slept here and you can rent the apartment – though it’s not a bargain B&B. You’ll need to contact high-end agents for details.

Napoleon III seems to have had a knack for predicting future movie locations. While exiled in London, he held secret meetings in the St James’s Street cellar which was used the backup HQ where Merlin finds the bottle of Kentucky bourbon in Kingsman: The Golden Circle.

For a break away from the constant nuisance of work on the house, Frances takes a trip to Rome, alighting from the bus in front of the huge and elaborate Victor Emmanuel II Monument.

In the best cinematic tradition of a woman alone in Rome, Frances is harassed by a trio of lecherous workmen on Via dei Cappellari just north of the junction with Via di Montoro, south of Piazza Navona in the Centro Storico.

In order to so shake them off, she grabs a random stranger exiting a shop at Via dei Coronari 27, quite a long way to the north, and pretends he's her husband. Marcello (Raoul Bova), the guy she picks, being unfeasibly handsome and disarmingly charming, starts to flirt with her on Piazza di San Simeone, that's the charming little square with the fountain nearby.

His more romantic approach ensures that he's soon whisking her off to his home on the Amalfi Coast where he lives in the beautiful seaside town of Positano, at the Hotel California Positano, Via Cristoforo Colombo, 141.

The colourful houses of Positano cling to the steep hillside above the shore like a vertical village, making the resort irresistibly photogenic – romantic holiday scenes for the 1969 musical version of Goodbye Mr Chips, with Peter O'Toole and Petula Clark, were also filmed here. Once again, the town works its magic and the two are soon hopping into bed.

Meanwhile, Pawel the young worker is having his own 'Romeo & Juliet' romance with local girl Chiara, whose parents intensely disapprove of him.

In an attempt to prove himself, Pawel participates in the lively and colourful flag throwing festival in the Piazza Grande of the beautiful Medieval hilltop town of Montepulciano, another beautiful Medieval hilltop town about 19 miles southwest of Cortona.

Flag-throwing, or 'sbandieratore', a traditional artform, is now a competitive sport in some European countries, often during festivals. In Montepulciano you may catch it during Bravìo delle Botte, a barrel-rolling competition held on the last Sunday in August. Careful to mind your head, though (the film substituted a styrofoam pole for the bump on the head).

You may recognise Montepulciano as the town standing in for 'Volterra', home of vampire royalty the Volturi, in The Twilight Saga: New Moon, 2009.

The various story strands follow their courses and eventually Pawel gets to marry Chiara, seemingly at the Temple of San Biagio, viale della Rimembranza, just southwest of the historic centre of Montepulciano.

Although that's the exterior, the interior proved too elaborate for the scene so the service is conducted inside a much simpler, plainer church.

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