Where was Roman Holiday filmed?

Seven decades after it charmed the world, this black-and-white romance remains one of the great love letters to Rome, and one of the first films to make a city itself the reason to visit. A princess slipping her chaperones for a single day of freedom gave audiences a giddy tour of the Eternal City, and the spots she races through are still mobbed today, often by visitors recreating the very same photographs.

The film leans on a handful of Rome's most photogenic landmarks. The Spanish Steps, the grand stairway rising in tiers above a piazza, are where the runaway royal pauses for an ice cream in one of cinema's most copied scenes. Elsewhere, the Mouth of Truth, the worn ancient marble face set in a church portico, becomes the stage for a playful dare built around the old legend that it bites the hands of liars.

For set-jetters, Rome makes the perfect walking city, and these two spots sit comfortably within a wider stroll past the capital's fountains, churches and squares. Go early to beat the crowds at the Spanish Steps, then wander toward the river for the Mouth of Truth. Pair the day with Rome's better-known antiquities for a trip that mixes movie nostalgia with the city's endless layers of history.