9 Best Movies Featuring Houses and Homes as a Major Role

Doors… Windows… And Lights, Camera, Action!

Some movie homes are unremarkable, but others leave a lasting impression. In fact, some are so iconic that they can be considered characters in their own right. Would these movies have been the same without the homes they featured? We don’t think so.

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Crotchety old Carl Fredrickson had enough of life in the city, so he decided to tie thousands of balloons to his little house and took to the skies with his accidental travel companion, a pudgy scout named Russell. All in all, it’s one of the most touching animated features ever released, and the charming, airborne bungalow certainly adds to its allure.

Howl’s Moving Castle

This breakout anime hit from Hayao Miyazaki follows the misadventures of Sophie, a young woman who is transformed into an old crone by an evil witch. It also features a walking, demon-possessed castle that goes ambling through a mythical world, creaking as it goes. In the end, the demon is freed and the castle is destroyed, but it certainly looked like fun while it lasted.

Monster House

In this family-friendly Halloween favorite, 12 year-old DJ Walters sets out to retrieve his basketball from Old Mr. Nebercracker’s lawn. The old man is notorious for confiscating toys from neighborhood kids, and when he catches DJ in his yard, he goes into a rage and has to be driven away in an ambulance due to an apparent heart attack. It turns out that Old Mr. Nebercracker was only trying to protect the kids from his terribly haunted house, which was possessed by his late wife, Constance the Giantess, who fell to her death in the basement. Yikes!

2001: A Space Odyssey

While spacecraft Discovery One doesn’t technically qualify as a home, it was home to the astronauts that set out for Jupiter in it. Everything was going well until the ship’s computer, HAL 9000, started getting buggy, and then, all hell broke loose. The last remaining astronaut manages to disconnect HAL, but not before the computer causes the deaths of all of the other crewmembers.

Scarface

Tony Montana lived the American dream – or at least a drug-fueled, hyper-violent version of it. The mansion where he enjoyed the fruits of his labor was a symbol of his success as a crime kingpin. But those who live by the sword die by the sword, and the mansion would also become the site of his last breath.

Home Alone

The stately Georgian home from the hit movie Home Alone didn’t have a speaking part in the movie, nor did it try to eat anyone. Still, it provided an ideal defensive rampart for young Kevin McAllister’s brilliant tricks and traps.

Sleepless in Seattle

In this iconic 90s rom-com, widower Sam Baldwin resided with his young son in a floating house on Lake Union. The house still exists, and is the largest floating home in the Seattle area. The home recently sold for more than $2 million.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

We’re not talking about Ferris’s house. We’re talking about his buddy Cameron’s home, the modernist masterpiece where the two best friends decide to take the Ferrari for a spin. The home recently sold for just over a million dollars, and the infamous glass garage is still standing.

The Royal Tenenbaums

The stately New York mansion featured in Wes Anderson’s highest-grossing film is actually located in Harlem at 339 Convent Avenue. It’s currently a private residence, and rumor has it that the home looks much the same as it did during filming. Of the 60 or so days that the movie took to film, more than half were spent at the house, and its atmosphere is a big part of the film’s visual appeal.