In the past few months, Vilnius has become a progressively more attractive filming location for crews coming from Europe and other continents. We talked to Jūratė Pazikaite, head of the Vilnius Film Office, about the possibilities, and the challenges, that the future holds for the Baltic capital city.

Cineuropa: In March, Vilnius hosted film crews from Estonia, Sweden, Ukraine, the USA and Lithuania, who were engaged in a total of 11 filming projects. Can you tell us more about this? How did the crews react to the city?
Jūratė Pazikaite: Film crews often cite three main advantages of filming in Vilnius: attractive Lithuanian tax incentives, a wide range of versatile locations all within close proximity, and highly professional crews with experience on major international productions. Vilnius offers a rich mix of architectural styles, from 17th-century historic buildings to socialist, modernist structures and modern skyscrapers. Just this year, the city has convincingly stood in for a variety of settings, including 1968 Paris and modern-day Stockholm. We noticed that international filmmakers are increasingly drawn not only to Vilnius’s iconic Old Town and central areas, but also to residential neighbourhoods, school buildings and interiors. We’re pleased to see that local residents – as well as institutions, cultural centres and owners of industrial spaces – are familiar with film productions and are open to accommodating filmmakers, embracing their creative visions and practical needs. We recently spoke with Estonian and Latvian producers who had just wrapped filming the drama Something Real, and we’re excited to share their thoughts. The producer of Something Real, Gunda Bergmane, said: “During pre-production, I could already sense how well prepared everyone was, which made this intense shooting schedule possible. This particular project is very location-heavy; we had so many locations in the script, both interior and exterior. Luckily, Vilnius is incredibly diverse – you can find aspects of several European cities in its architecture and aesthetics. I believe it will be interesting for Estonians to see these new places.”

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What are the challenges that Vilnius as a film set is facing at the moment?
We are currently experiencing growing demand for studio improvement, which is why we are working on developing film infrastructure to better meet this need.

Can you tell us more about Star City, the largest production in 2025 so far? The shooting of the series entailed assembling a crew of more than 130 industry professionals, a lot of whom were Lithuanians…
Star City is a new spin-off of the acclaimed science-fiction drama For All Mankind. “We are excited to be working in Vilnius,” stated Ben Nedivi and Matt Wolpert [the co-creators and showrunners of Star City and For all Mankind]. “The cinematic landscape and architecture of Vilnius will allow us to tell a gripping and authentic story. We are already amazed by the city and how accommodating it has been in our pursuit to expand the For All Mankind universe,” they added. Unfortunately, we cannot share any more about the project owing to confidentiality.

What are you doing to increase the visibility of the city, especially for international co-productions? Is there any forthcoming project that you could share information about?
In 2024 and 2025, Vilnius welcomed the Swedish-Belgian co-production We Come in Peace. For this project, Vilnius transformed into a chaotic Stockholm under alien invasion. Several key scenes – featuring protests and intense violence with crowds of extras and stunt performers – were filmed in the forests surrounding the city.

Another Swedish film studio completed filming a children's feature titled Villain of the Villains this spring. We’re also pleased that various streaming platforms are now showcasing recent TV series and films shot in Vilnius in recent years. These include the Lithuanian-Norwegian co-production No. 24 [+lire aussi :
bande-annonce
fiche film], in which Vilnius convincingly stands in for Norway. Other notable productions filmed in Vilnius and currently available include the TV series Whiskey on the Rocks [+lire aussi :
critique
bande-annonce
interview : Björn Stein
fiche série], which featured Lithuanian talent both in front of and behind the camera. We’re also eagerly awaiting the release of the US production Truth and Treason, where Vilnius is portrayed as 1940s Hamburg. Major foreign productions are forthcoming from the UK, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Germany and the USA.