Movies

Top Gun (1986)

Marine Corps Air Station Miramar's famed Top Gun pilot training school was immortalized by the adventures of Maverick (Tom Cruise) in this American classic.

Almost Famous (2000)

California native Cameron Crowe nabbed an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for this semi-autobiographical film starring Patrick Fugit as William Miller, a rock-obsessed teen following the fictional band Stillwater (with Billy Crudup as lead guitarist) on assignment for Rolling Stone.

Traffic (2000)

San Diego's proximity to Mexico made it an ideal setting for one of three intertwining plotlines in this Academy Award-winning film by Steven Soderbergh. The lives of San Diego drug lord (Steven Bauer) and his conniving wife (Catherine Zeta-Jones) are turned upside down after his arrest in this "coolly scathing overview of the multibillion-dollar drug trade and the largely futile war being waged against it," wrote the New York Times.

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004)

"Stay Classy, San Diego," is Anchorman Ron Burgundy's signature line in this Will Ferrell comedy about a washed-up news personality set downtown. Though most of the movie was filmed in Los Angeles, a few seconds of footage including the establishing shots and a Balboa Park scene, are pure San Diego.