Eiffel Tower Effect: Difference between revisions
no edit summary
m (update links) |
No edit summary |
||
| (20 intermediate revisions by 7 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|''"The gay cafés,
''The Eiffel Tower,
''The mayonnaise,
''The Eiffel Tower,
''La Marseillaise,
''The Eiffel Tower,
''The awe inspiring but so tiring Eiffel Tower!"''
|"That's What Makes Paris, [[Gay Paree|Paree]]" from ''[[April in Paris]]''}}
Some cities are renowned for their industries. Hollywood makes movies, Detroit makes... [[Dying Town|made]] cars. Others are known as hotspots for the scientific community, like Geneva. Or for the political community, like... Geneva. And in some places, there is a landmark. Such as [[Rule of Three|Geneva]].
A few of these landmarks, in various locations around the globe, are so well-known by so many people that they've come to function as a sort of visual shorthand for the city, sometimes the ''country'', in which they're located to the point where some footage of the landmark in question must be portrayed on the screen, even when that landmark is largely (or sometimes totally) irrelevant to the plot. The National Mall in Washington DC, Westminster Palace (specifically,
Iconic structures such as these can also function as [[Red Shirt
This trope is not simply here to list various landmarks around the world, but rather instances of landmarks in fiction used as a shortcut to showing either where the action occurs or how bad things have gotten.
Line 21 ⟶ 22:
The trope namer is on the Champ de Mars in Paris and was completed in 1889. [[The Other Wiki]] calls the Eiffel Tower "one of the most recognizable structures in the world."
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* [[Tokyo Tower]] functions this way in many anime; one of the most famous is in the ''[[X (manga)|X 1999]]'' manga, TV series and movie.
* ''[[Death Note]]'' uses both the Eiffel Tower and the London Eye for Paris and London at one point.
* In one episode of ''[[Ghost in the Shell:
** [[Rule of Cool]]: It's a shout-out to ''[[Wings of Desire]]''.
* During the Doma Arc of ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh (anime)|Yu-Gi-Oh]]'', when the Orichalcos Soldiers were attacking everywhere on Earth, the cities they were attacking were identified with a single famous landmark (e.g. the [[Britain Is Only London|Palace of Westminster]], the [[Big Applesauce|Empire State Building]], [[Land Down Under|Sydney Opera House]], [[Tokyo Tower]], [[Gay Paree|l'Arc de Triomphe]], etc., etc.)
== [[Film]] ==
* In the [[Bollywood]] film ''[[Don:
* Both ''[[National Treasure]]'' films did this in every single scene set in a major city. The Lincoln Memorial is the backdrop for a very serious discussion between Ben and Riley early on in the first film, apparently just so that they could get it in there.
** Fun fact: That scene was filmed on a day when the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was drained for maintenance. They digitally added the water back in, in post production.
* In ''[[The Avengers (1998 film)|The Avengers 1998]]'', the Big Ben was completely demolished by the film-makers to demonstrate that the bad guy was really, truly evil.
* ''[[Cloverfield]]'' made a point of taking out the Statue of Liberty. [[Monumental Damage|Beheading her, even.]]
* Largely averted in ''[[The Bourne Series (film)|The Bourne Supremacy]]''. You see the Eiffel Tower in Paris, but in a ground view and in the distant background as the hero walked across a courtyard. That is the only shot of it.
** Actually averted in [[The Bourne Series (film)|all the Bourne films]], as the entire series does away with all but absolutely necessary establishing shots and creates a very realistic version of Europe.
Line 43 ⟶ 44:
** They did, however, take out the Hollywood sign with some tornadoes.
* The 1st ''[[Harry Potter (film)|Harry Potter]]'' used a brief shot of Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, and the River Thames to establish London before we cut to Harry and Hagrid arriving at the Leaky Cauldron. The 6th shows the Millennium Bridge being destroyed by Death Eaters.
* ''[[Dhoom|Dhoom 2]]'' wanted to be sure everyone knew the second half of the movie took place in [[Brazil (useful notes)|Brazil]], so they made a very big deal out of the Christ The Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro. So much so that a scene in one of the songs took place there.
* In [[Roland Emmerich]]'s ''[[2012|Two Thousand Twelve]]'', it's the end of time! What happens at "the end of time"? Famous landmarks get destroyed! Time, meanwhile, apparently continues to flow.
* In the original ''[[Planet of the Apes]]'', the movie ends with Taylor finding a demolished Statue of Liberty "You animals! You finally gone and done it!"
* ''[[Armageddon]]'' had the Eiffel Tower demolished.
* The movie version of ''[[Being There]]'' takes place in and around Washington, D.C., but the setting is only gradually revealed to the audience because the film is confined to Chance's townhouse for its opening section. He's never been outside it, and it's in a poorer section of the city, so we don't start seeing landmarks like the Washington Monument, the White House, and the Capitol Building until he's wandered well away from it. Prior to this, the only hint that Chance lived in Washington was an ad for the ''Washington Post'' on a television.
* ''[[G.I. Joe: The
* ''[[The Mummy Trilogy|The Mummy Returns]]'' established clearly that the opening scene was set in London, by showing the Houses of Parliament, St Paul's Cathedral and Tower Bridge. All apparently next to each other.
** Continuing from the first movie, where you can see the Pyramids from Thebes.
* While the [[James Bond (film)|James Bond]] movies in general have used <s> Big Ben</s> Elizabeth Tower far more than necessary, a more [[Egregious]] example is in ''[[Goldfinger]]'' where Felix's office has a clear view of the White House, even though the CIA's headquarters are in the suburb of Langley, Virginia.
** Since the last third of ''[[A View to a Kill]]'' takes place in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area, it's perhaps inevitable that the film climaxes over the Golden Gate Bridge.
** And earlier in that film, May Day leaps off the Eiffel Tower itself.
Line 58 ⟶ 59:
* All sorts of science fiction movies have destroyed the Golden Gate Bridge as an avatar for San Francisco. In reality, crossing the bridge north from the city doesn't really go anywhere other than some ritzy bedroom communities and the sticks further north. Destroying the Bay Bridge would really put a serious wound in the city's infrastructure and many people's commutes, but [[Rule of Cool|the Golden Gate is a much prettier and more instantly-recognizable bridge]].
** Averted as a very brief joke in ''[[Star Trek (film)|Star Trek]]'', where {{spoiler|Spock shoots Nero's drill down when it's drilling into Earth, just above Starfleet Academy in San Francisco. The drill breaks up and part of it falls down...''just'' to the right of the Golden Gate Bridge and into the water.}}
* ''[[28
* In ''[[Casablanca]]'', Rick's Paris flashback begins with a shot of...the Arc de Triomphe.
* In ''[[Hudson Hawk]]'', the title character wakes up after being knocked out to find himself in Rome. He knows this because his hotel window just happens to face the Colosseum.
** Even better, when he then passes a door/window at a 90 degree angel with the first, he can still see the
* At the end of ''[[2010: The
* ''[[Inception]]'' is a bit of a [[Shoot the Money]] film, so we have [[Scenery Porn]] (and [[Scenery Gorn]]) in the form of the streets of Paris exploding outwards in a beautiful manner, folding in on themselves like a taco and during the scene where Ariadne plays with the use of mirrors on the street, the Eiffel Tower is visible in the background.
* In ''[[The Dark Knight Saga]]'' and before that ''[[Lara Croft:
* The ''[[Transformers (film)|Transformers]]'' movies are quite notorious for this by now. In the first film, we had the Hoover Dam, and Starscream partially destroyed one of its water towers. In the second, the Great Pyramids of Giza are ''directly'' across from the Rose Red City of Petra (what happened to Israel in-between?). Michael Bay was pretty happy about being allowed to film at both locations.
* Spoofed in ''[[Despicable Me]]'', where Gru is giving a speech to his minions in which he recalls some of their famous [[Impossible Thief|landmark-stealing capers]], including the theft of the Statue of Liberty ("The small one, from Las Vegas"), and the Eiffel Tower ("Also from Vegas").
Line 82 ⟶ 83:
* The City in ''[[Babe|Babe: Pig in the City]]'' is a massive parody of this. It contains every landmark mentioned on this page, all [http://www.remotecentral.com/dvd/babe2-4.jpg within view of the same window], and its streets are canals (as in [[City of Canals|Venice, Italy]]).
* ''[[Zodiac (film)|Zodiac]]'' uses a number of icons to show San Francisco, the Ferry Building, the Transamerica pyramid is shown frequently, though it's still under construction, Melvin Belli's St. Francis Wood mansion is shown to have a close view of Downtown San Francisco. In reality, the neighborhood is miles from Downtown and the view is obscured by hills.
* The Trans America Pyramid appears in ''[[The Social Network]]'' which would almost be a
* In ''[[Lost in Translation (film)|Lost in Translation]]'', there are multiple shots of the NTT Docomo Yoyogi Building. The final sequence immediately preceding the credits also features the Tokyo Tower. Though also averted when Charlotte briefly goes to Kyoto late in the film; the sequence somehow goes by without a single shot of that city's iconic landmarks like Kinkaku-ji, Kiyomizu-dera, Kyoto Tower or the thousand ''torii'' of Fushimi Inari-taisha.
== [[Literature]] ==
* In the [[Cory
== [[Live
* ''[[Highlander (TV series)|Highlander]]'' frequently featured numerous, plot-irrelevant establishing shots of the Eiffel Tower when the characters were hanging out in Paris.
* One episode of ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Star Trek the Next Generation]]'' features a scene in Paris where the Eiffel Tower is visible in the background of nearly every shot, even if two shots are facing in ''opposite directions''. It was a recreation of Picard's memories on the Holodeck, so maybe the computer was trying to be clear it was simulating France.
Line 101 ⟶ 103:
* ''[[Poltergeist: The Legacy]]'' often had stock footage of the Golden Gate Bridge, the Bay Bridge, and other San Francisco landmarks. There was also a scene in a bar in the Tenderloin (a famous [[San Francisco]] slum), with a crude mural of the Golden Gate, the Trans-America Pyramid, Coit Tower and a cable car.
* Virtually every episode of ''[[Charmed]]'' featured a montage of San Francisco aerial footage beneath the first-act credits, much like the ''CSI'' example below but even more extended. In later seasons, some of the main characters (with the ability to teleport at will) took to using the top of one of the Golden Gate Bridge's towers (or an approximation thereof on a Los Angeles soundstage) as a regular meeting place.
* ''[[CSI]]'' loves this. [[Vegas Montage|Vegas is shown in loving detail]] in nearly every episode. Expect to see tons of aerial shots of the Vegas strip at night. Especially of The Stratosphere.
* Spoofed on ''[[Joey]]'': Gina's appartment has a view of the Hollywood sign - if you lean back on the balcony. And then you only see the middle of it, so technically, it's a view of the OLLYWOO sign.
* ''[[Degrassi]]'''s rotation of [[Establishing Shot
** In Snake and Spike's wedding episode the DP tried valiantly to get them (on a lakeside boardwalk) and the tower's observation pod in the shot at the same time. And couldn't.
* In ''[[Smallville]]'', when Lana Lang visits Paris, the Notre Dame cathedral is always shown whenever the episode shifts to her story.
Line 139 ⟶ 141:
* The first level of ''Jungle Strike'' is set in Washington DC (the jungle comes later), so the bad guys' first targets are the Washington Monument, the Capitol Building, and the Library of Congress, with your base at the White House.
* In every version of ''Where In The World Is [[Carmen Sandiego]]?'', going to almost any country will immediately take you to its most famous landmark, which [[It's a Small World After All|just happens to be where the crook last was]]. Slightly subverted in the third version in which the Golden Gate Bridge, of all places, is the U.S. locale, presumably because the heroes' headquarters is supposed to be in [[San Francisco]].
* Act 3 of ''[[Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots]]'' takes place in an unnamed city somewhere in ''"Eastern Europe"''. However, the Charles Bridge makes it very obvious that it's Prague.
* ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'': Imagine had, in its intro, as one of the last surviving elements of Tokyo, the Tokyo Tower. Somewhat ironic given that game's portrayed genre, that tower's survival ratio is extremely low indeed.
* In ''[[Homestar Runner|Dangeresque 3]]'', all of the exotic cities are filmed in the same location with a really crappy cardboard cutout of a landmark or other relevant object sitting nearby. Paris gets the Eiffel Tower, naturally.
Line 169 ⟶ 171:
* In the opening credits of ''[[Jackie Chan Adventures]]'' the Golden Gate Bridge is a regular feature, and in the [[Grand Finale]] it is damaged along with half the city. However, once the [[Big Bad]] is defeated the city magically is repaired, saving the bridge presumeably. Also, the Bay Bridge, Transamerica Pyramid, and Coit Tower make apperances throughout the show.
* In ''[[An American Tail]]'', the Statue of Liberty is seen ''under construction'', thus using this trope to establish that the characters have arrived in New York of the past.
* [[Played for Laughs]] in the ''[[Rocko's Modern Life]]'' episode "Road Rash." When Heffer tells Rocko to take a shortcut on their motorcycle trip, they end up passing random world landmarks that are Egyptian Pyramids, Stonehenge (Heffer even tells Rocko to "turn right at Stonehenge,") a Venetian canal, Moai Statues on Easter Island, the Eiffel Tower (obviously), and the Taj Mahal in India. Even some [[Regional Riff
== [[Real Life]] ==
=== Africa ===
* Washington DC has a thirteen-story height cap on buildings within its city limits, so the Washington Monument is at least partly visible throughout a large portion of that city.▼
* South African TV news, when broadcasting from Johannesburg, includes an opening shot of the Hillbrow Tower, even though it's just a radio antenna and the newsroom isn't in there, to establish the location (justified in that it's the tallest building in Africa). Foreign news stories tend to include shots of Table Mountain if an event happened anywhere in South Africa generally. This is sometimes quite funny, as if you were reporting on an event happening in Maine while showing a picture of the Statue of Liberty. Close, but no cigar.▼
** Supposedly some building codes in the area were made for intelligence and counterintelligence purposes.▼
* As mentioned before, the Great Pyramid of Giza and/or the Sphinx is generally the establishing shot for Cairo, or anywhere else in Egypt for that matter. Egyptian and other Middle Eastern productions tend to use the [[wikipedia:Cairo Tower|Cairo Tower]] or [[wikipedia:Tahrir Square|Tahrir Square]] for Cairo. ▼
* The aforementioned CN Tower is similar to the Washington Monument, but for different reasons. It's not that the buildings in Toronto are especially small, it's just the CN Tower ''really is that huge''.▼
=== The Americas ===
==== Brazil ====
* Apparently, there's only one statue in the entire country: the Christ The Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro.
==== Canada ====
▲* The aforementioned CN Tower is similar to the Washington Monument, but for different reasons. It's not that the buildings in [[Toronto]] are especially small, it's just the CN Tower ''really is that
** It can even been seen from some points north of the city.
*** It can be seen (on a very clear day) in ''Rochester, New York'', which is on the other side of a Great freakin' Lake and in another country.
* When you see Parliament Hill on a TV show, you know (a) the episode is set in Ottawa, and (b) the show was made by the [[CBC]].
* In Paris itself this does happens to some degree with the Eiffel Tower, visible from the entire Western half of the city, and to the dismay of many Parisians, it also happens with the Montparnasse tower and the Southern half.▼
** Some go out of their way to avoid this effect: Novelist [[Guy de Maupassant]] supposedly ate lunch in the Tower's restaurant every day. When asked why, he answered that, as no big fan of the Tower, it was the one place in Paris where he knew he wouldn't see it.▼
==== Mexico ====
* [[Mexico]]'s main cities are not exempt from this. Mexico City has this with the Zócalo, a huge slab of concrete bearing a huge monumental flag, as well as with the Angel of Independence and the Reform Avenue, whereas Guadalajara has this with the cathedral, the Minerva Roundabout, and more recently, the small patch of skyscrapers near Puerta de Hierro in the northwest. Monterrey, however, is best represented by the prominent Saddle Hill (Cerro de la Silla).▼
==== The USA ====
▲* [[Washington DC]] has a thirteen-story height cap on buildings within its city limits, so the Washington Monument is at least partly visible throughout a large portion of that city.
▲** Supposedly some building codes in the area were made for intelligence and counterintelligence purposes.
* [[New York City]] used to be instantly recognizable by the Twin Towers. Since 9/11, the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, The Statue of Liberty or the UN headquarters building are forced to stand in instead.
** The Statue of Liberty has been used to establish a New York setting since the very beginning of film.
** There's a reason why King Kong climbed the Empire State Building
* While [[The Windy City|Chicago]]'s tallest building is the Willis Tower, it's the John Hancock Center that's the city's true "signature" structure.
** But the [[wikipedia:Chicago Board of Trade Building|Board Of Trade]] is the ''coolest'' Chicago building...
** [[wikipedia:Marina City#Cultural references|Marina City]] gets used a lot, too. It's sometimes called "[[Wilco]] Towers" since its
* The Gateway Arch in [[St. Louis]]. For Missouri in general. That's what ended up on the back of the Missouri quarter.
* The Golden Gate Bridge in [[San Francisco]] (prevalent in the title credits in ''[[Full House]]'', for one). You can substitute trolley cars for similar effect.
* The Space Needle's entire reason for existence seems to be as a means to set up establishing shots of [[Seattle]]. Never mind that the Needle itself is dwarfed by surrounding buildings to such a degree that it ends up looking comically small if not framed well.▼
* Probably even more visible (though far less spectacular) than the tower in Paris is the Petřínská rozhledna on a hilltop in Prague, a city with few skyscrapers. Unfortunately, despite being higher up than the real Eiffel Tower, it's still not as conspicuous in the skyline as [http://members.virtualtourist.com/vt/t/354 the world's second ugliest building].▼
▲* South African TV news, when broadcasting from Johannesburg, includes an opening shot of the Hillbrow Tower, even though it's just a radio antenna and the newsroom isn't in there, to establish the location (justified in that it's the tallest building in Africa). Foreign news stories tend to include shots of Table Mountain if an event happened anywhere in South Africa generally. This is sometimes quite funny, as if you were reporting on an event happening in Maine while showing a picture of the Statue of Liberty. Close, but no cigar.
▲* The Space Needle's entire reason for existence seems to be as a means to set up establishing shots of Seattle. Never mind that the Needle itself is dwarfed by surrounding buildings to such a degree that it ends up looking comically small if not framed well.
** It also stands somewhat apart from the rest of the skyline, another reason for exact framing. As a result, every photo of the Seattle skyline is shot from the same angle. This often results in the Needle looking much taller on film than it is in real life.
** One of the Seattle area's other iconic landmarks, Mount Rainier, is easily visible from a large portion of Washington State on a clear day.
* The Oriental Pearl shows up in nearly every establishing shot of Shanghai.▼
* Tian'anmen gate is often used as a establishing shot for Beijing, but as a bit of a subversion, the structure is only visible if you stand next to it. Classical Chinese architecture is rather disdainful of the vertical dimension. Chinese television and movies tend to use the CCTV tower instead. ▼
* For Rochester, Minnesota, the most obvious landmark is the Mayo Clinic, specifically Saint Mary's Hospital (though the Clinic's in-town buildings as a whole take up approximately three-quarters of the downtown area of the city and growing, with a pedestrian subway interconnecting most if not all of them underground; Saint Mary's is probably the most readily recognizable amongst the Clinic's buildings, even among longtime citizens of Rochester). The place is extremely famous as one of the greatest medical facilities known to man, treating a wide gamut of people from average Joes who travel from all over the nation to receive better care than is available to them in their respective hometowns to celebrities, heads of state (former and current from all over the globe), even the Dalai Lama and at least one Pope.
* [[Atlanta]], Georgia has the Georgia Dome, but usually the rest of the skyline is shown as well. Also, expect to see at least one person owning a plantation-style home.
* [[Los Angeles]] has the US Bank Tower, which is the tallest and usually the most recognizable skyscraper in the city. It's usually shown in establishing shots when the story takes place in Los Angeles, or they'll show the whole skyline if the shot is being taken from one of the many hills. Sometimes a shot of the Hollywood sign is used as well/instead (however the Hollywood sign can only be seen in Hollywood, and not throughout LA, unlike the Bank Tower.)▼
* In Seoul, [[South Korea]], Namsam Tower (or N Seoul Tower), is 777 feet tall on top of Namsam Mountain. From the restaurant on the 4th Observation Deck, you can see the entire city. Oh, and the main access is by cable car with a 13-degree gradient.▼
* In [[Taiwanese Series]], the Taipei 101 building in the country's capitol, is the tallest building on the island and tends to show up in the background of at least one episode.▼
▲* Los Angeles has the US Bank Tower, which is the tallest and usually the most recognizable skyscraper in the city. It's usually shown in establishing shots when the story takes place in Los Angeles, or they'll show the whole skyline if the shot is being taken from one of the many hills. Sometimes a shot of the Hollywood sign is used as well/instead (however the Hollywood sign can only be seen in Hollywood, and not throughout LA, unlike the Bank Tower.)
* In the ultra-rare instances where you're filming in Salt Lake City ([[California Doubling|And want the audience to know you're filming in Salt Lake City]]), the Salt Lake Mormon Temple will be briefly shown.
▲* Mexico's main cities are not exempt from this. Mexico City has this with the Zócalo, a huge slab of concrete bearing a huge monumental flag, as well as with the Angel of Independence and the Reform Avenue, whereas Guadalajara has this with the cathedral, the Minerva Roundabout, and more recently, the small patch of skyscrapers near Puerta de Hierro in the northwest. Monterrey, however, is best represented by the prominent Saddle Hill (Cerro de la Silla).
* A supposedly rare example for lesser known state capitals would be Albany's [http://img.online-station.net/_news/2009/0303/23964_39TheEggEmpireStatePlazaAlbanyNewYo.jpg Empire State Plaza], which typically consists of a unique flying saucer-shaped venue called The Egg, and the Erastus Corning Tower, which is quite justified, considering that it happens to be the tallest building in Upstate New York.
=== Asia ===
▲* The Oriental Pearl shows up in nearly every establishing shot of [[Shanghai]].
▲* Tian'anmen gate is often used as a establishing shot for [[Beijing]], but as a bit of a subversion, the structure is only visible if you stand next to it. Classical Chinese architecture is rather disdainful of the vertical dimension. Chinese television and movies tend to use the CCTV tower instead.
▲* In Seoul, [[South Korea]], Namsam Tower (or N Seoul Tower), is 777 feet tall on top of Namsam Mountain. From the restaurant on the 4th Observation Deck, you can see the entire city. Oh, and the main access is by cable car with a 13-degree gradient.
▲* In [[Taiwanese Series]], the Taipei 101 building in the country's capitol, is the tallest building on the island and tends to show up in the background of at least one episode.
* Thousands of Armenian paintings and photographs would suggest that Mt. Ararat is visible all over the country, when in fact it has to be a really clear day to be able to see it from its capital, Yerevan. And partly due to a long, sad history of horrible luck, Armenia's most iconic landmark isn't even in Armenia anymore but in Turkey.
* [[Tokyo]] is large enough that ''each ward'' has its own iconic landmarks. These include Shibuya's scramble crossing and ''109'' department store (both of which can be fit in the same shot) or NTT Docomo Yoyogi Building, the Akihabara strip, the gates to the Senso temple in Asakusa, the row of natural gas tanks in Nerima, the Kabukicho arch and Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building in Shinjuku, Sumida's Skytree, and of course Minato's Eiffel-lookalike [[Tokyo Tower]].
* Many recent British productions have used [[wikipedia:30 St Mary Axe|the Gherkin]] in establishing montages because of its distinctive architecture. London's tallest tower [[wikipedia:Shard London Bridge|the Shard]] may be joining it once it's finished in 2012.▼
▲* As mentioned before, the Great Pyramid of Giza and/or the Sphinx is generally the establishing shot for Cairo, or anywhere else in Egypt for that matter. Egyptian and other Middle Eastern productions tend to use the [[wikipedia:Cairo Tower|Cairo Tower]] or [[wikipedia:Tahrir Square|Tahrir Square]] for Cairo.
=== Europe ===
* Any time Auckland, New Zealand appears, the [[wikipedia:Sky Tower|Sky Tower]] is guaranteed to be shown. Justified, since it is a 328m (1076ft) structure in a city where there are hardly any 100m+ buildings. Locals sometimes use the tower as a compass, since it can been seen from far and is to the north from most of the city.▼
▲* In Paris itself this does happens to some degree with the Eiffel Tower, visible from the entire Western half of the city, and to the dismay of many Parisians, it also happens with the Montparnasse tower and the Southern half.
▲** Some go out of their way to avoid this effect: Novelist [[Guy de Maupassant]] supposedly ate lunch in the Tower's restaurant every day. When asked why, he answered that, as no big fan of the Tower, it was the one place in Paris where he knew he wouldn't see it.
▲* Probably even more visible (though far less spectacular) than the tower in Paris is the Petřínská rozhledna on a hilltop in Prague, a city with few skyscrapers. Unfortunately, despite being higher up than the real Eiffel Tower, it's still not as conspicuous in the skyline as [https://web.archive.org/web/20131106035803/http://members.virtualtourist.com/vt/t/354 the world's second ugliest building].
▲* Many recent{{when}} British productions have used [[wikipedia:30 St Mary Axe|the Gherkin]] in establishing montages because of its distinctive architecture. London's tallest tower [[wikipedia:Shard London Bridge|the Shard]] may be joining it once it's finished in 2012.{{verify}}
=== Elsewhere ===
▲* Any time Auckland, New Zealand appears, the [[wikipedia:Sky Tower|Sky Tower]] is guaranteed to be shown. Justified, since it is a
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Spectacle]]
▲[[Category:Eiffel Tower Effect]]
| |||