Boston Movie Tours

Visit locations of famous movie and TV shows made in Boston

Boston movie tours give you a unique sightseeing opportunity: the chance to see locations featured in your favorite movies and TV shows while getting a unique perspective on some of Boston's most interesting neighborhoods.

You can choose from two different tours - a seasonal walking tour of Beacon Hill and a year-round bus tour of several top neighborhoods, which gets my vote for the best Boston tour for winter months.

"I look at Boston in a different way since I took the Boston Movie Mile Tour.

I now see Boston Common as a battleground . . . speeding cars crashing into the gates of the Public Garden . . . Beacon Hill's Louisberg Square as the prowling ground of the Boston Strangler.

Then there's the massive luxury ocean liner explosion in Boston Harbor . . .

But more about that in a moment!"

Both Boston Movie Tours take you to the exact locations you've seen featured in films and TV shows:

The Departed
Cheers
Blown Away
Ally McBeal
Glory
Boston Legal
Zach and Cody
Fever Pitch
Gone Baby Gone
Mystic River
Good Will Hunting

Best of all you can use our exclusive Boston Movie Tour Coupon Code (BDG10) to get a 10% discount on your tickets, and get ready to visit places you may have already seen on the big screen.

Cheers, Beacon Hill bar shown in exterior shots of the famous TV show

The fun starts as soon as you meet your tour guide - a local actor guide who will share insider stories about the neighborhoods and the movies, movie trivia, plus own personal insights as you look at photos or watch film clips of the movies and shows being made - sometimes on the very spot where you're standing!

What to Expect on Your Movie Tour

Boston Movie Mile Walking Tour - My Experience!

The hour and a half Boston Movie Mile Walking Tour takes you on foot around historic Beacon Hill, home to gorgeous brick mansions, unique shops, and more than its share - in the past - of the city's most grisly murders.

I recently took this tour along with eight Boston visitors from all over the United States as well as Greece. Our guide Chris led us across Boston Common, where the tour began, and through the narrow winding streets of Beacon Hill on a beautiful early fall day with just a hint of color showing in the leaves overhead.

As we walked across Boston Common, Chris pointed out the site of the rugby scene in The Departed as we glimpsed a real-life rugby game being played by a group of 20-somethings a few hundred yards away.

Boston Movie Tours leader as we go down Beacon Street

Chris leading us down historic Beacon Street at the foot of Beacon Hill

Then we began our exploration of Beacon Hill, one of Boston's oldest neighborhood and the best historically preserved, where property values rank, on average, as the highest in the city.

Not surprisingly, Beacon Hill's narrow tree-lined streets lined with gas lights and stately brick mansions look great on the big screen and in fact, this is the most-filmed part of Boston.

Louisberg Square in Boston's Beacon Hill

The Boston Strangler, as well as several other movies, used the Louisberg Square area shown in this photo as a scenic backdrop.

Beacon Hill's main shopping area, Charles Street, figures prominently in lots of movies. Hearing Chris's explanations about about the behind-the-scenes transformations required to make familiar neighborhood sights screen-worthy provided fascinating insights into how movies are made.

Boston Movie Tours points out Beacon Hill movie site from The Departed

The Charles Street Cleaners transformed into Jack Nicholson's bar in The Departed

A highlight of the Boston Movie Mile Walking Tour came as we walked down the fairly steep slope of Joy Street toward Beacon Street and the Public Garden.

"See that gate post?" Chris asked. It's the one you can see in the left background in my photo below.

Boston Movie Tours stops by Public Garden crash scene

Segway riders tracing the

"That's the sight of the crash in the car chase scene in Blown Away," Chris tells us. "They had to build out a fake gate with styrofoam and padding to protect the real one."

Blown Away, the Tommy Lee Jones and Jeff Bridges film about an Irish bomber who targets a member of the Boston Bomb Squad, also involved an exploding ocean liner, leading to one of the most interesting bits of trivia revealed during the tour: the explosion, which caused 8,000 broken windows in East Boston, cost $2.5 million to film (including damages) and was the largest movie explosion to date.

Blown Away also has the honor of being the last explosion movie to be filmed in Boston.

All together, we walked by 30+ filming locations during our 1 1/2 hour stroll while Chris continued to share film lore, bits of history, and more interesting trivia.

By time we arrived at our final destination, the famous Cheers Bar on Beacon Street where Chris took my photo in front of the sign made famous by the TV show, I knew I'd never look at Beacon Hill in quite the same way again!

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Boston TV & Movie Sites Tour - Boston's Best Year-Round Tour

The 3-hour Boston TV & Movie Sites Tour, like the Boston Movie Mile tour, immerses you in Boston sightseeing, movie-making lore, and plenty of film history. However, its format is totally different, and it gets my vote for Boston's best year-round tour.

If you've check out Boston tour options for winter months, you may have discovered that most - including the Boston Movie Miles tour - take a break for the winter. After all, who wants to trudge around icy streets while the wind howls and snow pelts down?

Of course, that's a slight exaggeration - that kind of winter weather doesn't happen every day. But the possibility that it might dampens enthusiasm for walking tours, and even the very popular Boston Duck Boat tours take a winter break after Thanksgiving - can't exactly cruise along the Charles River once it freezes! Most bus tours also cease for a few months.

But fortunately, the Boston TV & Movie Sites Tour continues year-round, and provides an excellent combination of entertainment and sightseeing through several neighborhoods as you visit 40+ Boston sites featured in films and shows.

What makes this tour especially cool are the overhead screens on the bus where you'll get to see clips of the movies and TV shows, so you can compare how a scene looked on the screen with how it looks in real life.

The bus tour makes several stops along the way for photos and exploration - if the weather is awful, just stay on the bus in comfort. You'll even have a chance to stop for a drink at the L Street Tavern in Southie featured in Good Will Hunting - and you may want to get off the bus for that one!

The comfortable movie tour buses have both air conditioning and heat - so when Boston turns rainy, hot and steamy, or freezing cold, this tour makes an ideal bad-weather day activity. You'll cruise around in comfort, see interesting sights, with the movie clips and tour guide for additional entertainment.

Boston Movie Tours Tickets and Discounts

On Location Tours, which operates Boston Movie Tours (as well as New York movie tours), offers a 10% discount on tickets when you book in advance through their website, www.screentours.com. To get your ticket discount, enter Boston Discovery Guide's promo code BDG10 when making your reservations on line (you'll see the promo code box on the screen).

You need to book in advance in any case, due to limited space. (I've heard that the city imposes strict limits on tour group sizes to avoid congestion - Boston streets really are very narrow.) Because these popular tours fill up quickly, make your reservations 2-3 weeks in advance to be sure of getting a spot.

Get your movie tour reservations now

Remember, enter our Promo Code "BDG10" to get your 10% discount. We can offer this discount because we're an affiliate of On Location Tours - thank you, OLT!

Boston Movie Mile Schedules and Tickets - Walking Tour

Offered April through October, 2:30 pm
- April - May: Saturday and Sunday
- June - August: Friday - Sunday
- September - October: Saturday

Duration: Approximately 1.5 hours
Departs from: Boston Common - Tourist Information Center on Tremont Street, across from the West Street intersection
Tickets: $20 + $2 fee Make Reservations Now Discount code BDG10 for 10% savings

Boston Insider Tip: This tour takes place rain or shine. Be sure to wear comfortable walking shoes and bring an umbrella if there's any possibility of rain.

Boston TV & Movie Sites - Bus Tour

Offered throughout the year at 11 am
- January - March: Saturday and Sunday
- April - May: Saturday and Sunday
- June - August: Thursday - Sunday
- September - October: Saturday and Sunday
- November - December: Saturday

Duration: Approximately 3 hours
Departs from: Boston Common - Tourist Information Center on Tremont Street, across from the West Street intersection
Tickets: $38 + $2 fee Reservations Use Discount code BDG10

Whether you're a first time Boston visitor looking for unique sightseeing tours or a Boston Local looking for an interesting way to entertain out of town guests or get a new view of the city, you'll find plenty to enjoy in these tours while seeing Boston from a new perspective.

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"Insider" Tip for Boston Movie Mile Tours

Didn't bring an umbrella and rain looks likely?

The best place near Boston Common to buy a cheap umbrella is in a small phone card store (also has Boston tourism information prominently displayed) at the corner of Tremont and West Streets, almost directly across from the Tourist Information Center.

Look for the "Umbrellas" sign on the sidewalk on rainy days. My experience is that these cheap umbrellas last as long or longer than more expensive ones.

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